Letter writer RON EDGECOMBE, of Evatt says the large increase in his annual rates appears to “finally fully expose the deviousness and deceit behind Andrew Barr’s 2012-13 residential rates reforms”.

LOOKING at my Residential Valuation Notice for 2022, there is a massive increase of $264,000 in the unimproved value (UV) of January 1, 2022, compared to January 1, 2021.

My block is not near any potential rezoning area such as local shops or community facilities.

This large increase appears to finally fully expose the deviousness and deceit behind Andrew Barr’s 2012-13 residential rates reforms. Consider the following points:

• Barr claimed after this year’s budget that the residential rates reform would conclude in 2030. That means that rates will continue to increase above CPI as part of the reforms for the next seven years.
• The average unimproved value (AUV) of a property is used to calculate rates and other taxes. From 2021, the AUV has been extended to five years.
• If all residential properties have been determined to have a large increase (as mine) for January 1, 2022, this will mean that this increase and any subsequent increases in UVs will continue to exponentially increase the AUV each year, up to 2030, thus significantly increasing the annual rates levies. This is on top of the seven years of percentage increases anticipated under the reforms. This appears to be a triple financial hit to residential households (and also renters if landlords pass on these rate increases).

There are several possible reasons for the UV increases including:

• The deliberate actions by the Barr government to strictly limit the release of new land blocks to drive up government revenues; this in turn “justifies” the UV increases outlined above to existing land blocks.
• The proposed intent in the new planning reforms to designate all residential land as suitable for multi building development (instead of the existing arrangements for RZ1 etcetera).
• The government’s ever increasing requirement to increase revenue from all ACT residents to in the main cover the cost of light rail stage 2A and B, let alone fund the ongoing costs of essential government services and pay back increasing government debts.

 The previous review commissioned by the government to assess the impact of the ACT residential rates reforms on stakeholders found that there was no net effect on ACT residents and that the financial impact was neutral is surely seriously questionable in light of the above comments. 

In particular the increased wealth transfer to the government in terms of increased rates revenue from 2022 to 2030 from ACT residents does not appear to be neutral. 

Ron Edgecombe, Evatt

Rates: How is this equitable?

The ACT government’s method of calculating residential rates clearly needs further revision. A five-bedroom, fully updated home with three bathrooms on a 900sqm block, around the corner from mine in Bonython, sold last week for $1.2 million. 

The advertised rates were $2392 pa. My house is an unrenovated, three-bedroom, 1 bathroom dual occupancy on 485 square metres of the dual block, worth around half that. My rates are $2376 pa. 

A friend with a two-bedroom apartment built in the ’80s near the former CIT campus in Woden, worth less again, pays more rates than I do. 

How is this equitable? The ACT Revenue Office website states: “Following community feedback… the government introduced further changes to improve fairness in how unit rates are calculated.” 

Those changes obviously haven’t gone far enough. Looks like Mr Barr is pushing people into units, then milking them for the privilege.

Diane Osborne, Bonython 

All fired up; I’m going to start a political party!

AFTER reading two articles in “CityNews” (“Berry treats community spaces like a land bank” and “Flooding will dog park development, say residents”, CN September 22) I am all fired up. I am going to register a new political party in the ACT.

Party members will acknowledge the effects of human-induced climate change and will be opposed to silly policies such as allowing housing development to occur in flood-prone areas. 

They will be supportive of the need for spaces for community activity, sport and recreation and will not be in favour of residential and commercial development on existing spaces such as ovals and golf courses. 

The party will be unwavering in its support of residents whose rights are being threatened by development which disregards current planning regulations.

Because the policies will have a lot to do with the environment, I am going to call it the Greens Party. I think that it should be a winner at the next ACT election.

David Pederson, O’Connor

Dangerous e-scooter scourge in Canberra

THE death of a 19 year old woman riding an e-scooter in Kambah is a further reminder of the dangerous e-scooter scourge in Canberra, expanded recently with the blessing of the ACT government. 

Many letter writers to local media, including “CityNews”, have underlined the risks to both e-scooter riders and pedestrians. 

In Victoria, a recent report outlined the injuries sustained, including severe brain and spinal injuries. The number of pedestrians admitted to the Alfred Hospital’s intensive care unit has reached a five-year high, with 66 people brought into the ICU in the past 12 months.

On road safety grounds, the ACT government introduced 40 km/h speed zones in the central Civic area for cars, yet is apparently happy to expand the use of e-scooters with a known track record for seriously injuring pedestrians on footpaths.

What amazes me is the sheer lack of foresight on the part of the ACT government. Many of these events are just accidents waiting to happen. 

E-scooters should not be on footpaths at all, endangering pedestrians by their often fast presence. And even if better controls were implemented, who is going to police them? 

Surely the ACT government is not expecting police resources to now extend to oversight of e-scooter behaviour across the city.

Murray May, Cook

Government not sharing tram costs

A FEW weeks ago, Chief Minister Barr baulked at the figure of $200 million to move Parkes Way some metres to the south that would be needed to accommodate a stadium on the current swimming pool site. That was a good call. However, raising London Circuit for Stage 2A of light rail is a far more complicated project which, on the basis of the Parkes Way estimate, would cost about $800 million, if not more. 

I don’t see Mr Barr baulking at that outrageous waste of public funds on the tram to nowhere. 

The Rattenbury/Barr government has at least a moral obligation to tell taxpayers what Stage 2A and Stage2B will cost them, but this government has a bad habit of not releasing such cost estimates because of a certain reaction from taxpayers. 

For what it may be worth to readers, my latest cost estimates for Stage 2A is $1.1 billion to build and operate (including $800 million for raising London Circuit) and for Stage 2B, a further $2.1 billion (including $500 million for the bridge), for a probable minimum cost in 2022 dollars of $3.2 billion (over build time and 20 years of operations). By comparison, Stage 1 is costing about $1.45 billion for the same distance (12km). 

Use of electric buses would take half the time for the Woden-City trip and avoid the $1.3 billion for raising London Cct and a new or modified bridge.

Note also that planned development along the route does not depend on trams; rapid buses would do just as well.

Do readers really think this a fair thing to be kept secret by the government?

Max Flint, co-ordinator, Smart Canberra Transport

What’s in a name when it comes to trams?

JOHN Lawrence (Letters, CN September 27) proposes a competition to name Canberra’s trams.

I nominate “Bartram” for the name of the first tram.

Leon Arundell, Downer

Community planning advocate, anyone?

I WAS interested and impressed to learn that Waverley Council in Sydney – to the outrage of the developer class (“NIMBYism at its worst”) – has appointed a community planning advocate to help residents’ groups better understand, input and influence planning outcomes that will impact them.

Wouldn’t happen here, thought I ruefully. Must be a Labor Council in Waverley. But hang on …

John Griffin, via email 

Climate change: a natural phenomenon

I am beginning to wonder whether renewable energy, as currently protracted, can be a means of arresting global warming and climate change in the world.

In its 2022 Integrated System Plan for reaching zero emissions by 2050, the Australian Energy Market Operator states that we will need nine times today’s utility scale variable renewables (wind, solar and hydro). Assuming wind turbines have an average capacity of 5 megawatt (MW) there would be about 25,000 turbines.

Even if Australia reaches this goal, it will be pointless unless the world also acts.

In the case of China with forty times our energy requirements, reliance on wind and solar to bring about zero emissions has some seemingly insurmountable problems. 

The population is concentrated in the east of the country while regions suitable for wind turbines and solar farms are in the west, akin to Australia having all its renewable resources in WA. 

Furthermore, with its megacities, distributed energy resources such as rooftop solar are not an option for China, leaving the challenge of erecting one million 5MW turbines, an equivalent number of solar farms, and building long-distance transmission lines of enormous capacity.

So, China may have no option other than a nuclear-powered electricity network to reach anything near zero emissions, hardly something on which Australia can take the moral high ground.

John Smith, Farrer

Macklin missed only one gift of Albo’s 

I ENJOYED very much Robert Macklin’s “The Gadfly” column “It’s easy to underestimate the wily Albo” (CN September 29). 

It summarised the extraordinary ability of our latest prime minister to cut through the “BS” and get to the heart of the issues confronting him, and to arrive at solutions acceptable by the (great) majority, by using the wisdom passed down to him by his mother.

The only significant gift not highlighted by Mr Macklin is Albo’s well-developed negotiating skill: persuasion rather than lecturing, instructing or ordering. What a contrast to the “my way or the highway” attitude of his predecessor!

Dr Douglas Mackenzie, Deakin

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