In April last year, the High Court of Australia affirmed the right of a West Tasmanian council to levy rates on the seabed within its municipal boundaries. This precedent means, in a legal sense, land is land, even underwater. It has implications for industrial...
by Noah Smith The idea of a Land Value Tax (LVT) is to tax the value of land independently of the value of improvements on that land (e.g. buildings, farms, or mines). Separating the value of a plot of land from the value of the structure built on top of it is a very...
Midnight Wednesday, the Queensland Parliament amended the Local Government Act and the City of Brisbane Act to legalise the theft of around $2.3 billion in differential rates charged by 20 councils on non-resident owners over the last twenty years. The...
The Queensland Supreme Court has struck out the differential rate some Queensland councils charge investors over and above residents on similar properties. Councils may be forced to pay it all back. $300 million a year is in doubt. This landmark decision exposes the...
17 October 2012 The survey of Victorian local government candidates conducted by Prosper Australia ahead of the 26 October election reveals few candidates understand where and how councils are funded. “We learned only a handful appreciate Site Value Rating is a...
From the Canberra Times 5 April 2012. Your article “Capital’s housing prices highest in the country” (April 3, p1) was missing one very important word – land. As we move toward Canberra’s centenary celebrations it is time to reflect on the great wedge that is driving...
21 Nov 2011 Moonee Valley Leader Council’s three strikes HINDSIGHT (‘‘Cinema plan stalled’’, Leader, November 14) has confirmed what we suspected at the time: the first mistake by the former Moonee Valley Council commissioners was to close the Moonee Ponds Market. We...
photo credit: dcmasterBarry O’Farrell was elected Premier of NSW in March this year. His first budget announced Tuesday raised a storm of protest – not over a realignment of government priorities to his conservative Coalition’s agenda, but on Stamp Duty. The previous...
Dr Gavin Putland of the Land Values Research Group drives a stake through a vampire heart in the Letters page of today's Australian Financial Review Joanne Seve (Letters, August 5) regurgitates the property lobby's favourite untruth, namely that land tax is passed on...