PM Transcripts

flNTERVI-, lW WITH THE P= IME= hSTER BY CY-AIN 7 -BRISBANE 4 OCTOBER 1975
Q( JESIO: Mr hitlam, has the Senate any right to reject Supply?
PM It's very dubious no Senate has ever refused Supply to the
Government in the Australian Parliament, and this would
not now happen anywhere in the world. It's not been
possible, for instance, in Britain for the House of
Lords to do this since 1911.
QUESTION: Supposing they do force an election on these grounds?
PIM : Oh, well when you say force an election, it is for me to
advise the Governor-General whether there should be an
election fLo--the House of Representatives or when he should
ask the State Governors to issue writs for an election for
half the Senate. That can be done at any time between
now and the end of June when there has to be an election
Kfor half the Senate. Or it's my job to advise the
Governor-General whether there should be a double dissolution,
an election for the whole of the Senate as well as the
House of Representatives.
,, JESTIOW: Nowi the Liberal, th olto seems to be basing its
hopes on a double taxation system. Do you think that
will catch votes?
PM No, I think this will lose votes because don't -' believe
that Australians want to go back to the ' system. '. which
applied in Australia before the war, and which still
applies in Cana'aa. This system where you have Federal
income taxes, evarybody in Australia has to pay them,
but on top of -t:-at the-people in each State have to pay an
additional State income tax. And -in Canada still, and in
K A ustralia before the war, this meant that the people
paid diffe:: ent taxes in each State. For instance, the
big States like New South Wales and Victoria paid a lower
rate of State income tax; all the other States, including
Queensland, pain a higher rate of State income tax. The only people
who benefited were the people in Canberra, because they didn't
have to pay State tax. So that's the reason why Sir Gordon
Chalk, the Liberal leader here, the Treasurer, and people
like Kevin Cairns, one of the Liberals MHR's from Queensland,
have expressed such misgivings about this proposal to go
back to double taxation. It's really a system of unequal
taxation.
QUESTION: Thank you Mr WNThitlam