The Deputy Leader of the Opposition, Mr Gareth Evans, made it
abundantly clear this morning that his Party has no stomach for removing
the huge unfairness in Australia's taxation system.
On "Meet the Press" he foreshadowed yet another adhoc, Bandaid
approach to an ailing unfair system.
He admitted that under a Labor government some wholesale tax rates
could go up.
This is ominously similar to Labor's performance in 1993.
Then it campaigned against genuine tax reform, yet back in office
it slugged low income earners with huge increases in indirect taxation
without any compensation.
It is in the interests of all Australians that the unfairness of the
present system be removed.
This will not be achieved through tinkering at the edges which is
what Mr Evans has in mind.
That would be a repeat of 1993 which left the whole system even more
unfair.
The government's reform package will remove the unfairness of
the present system. Labor's adhoc approach will not.
For the good of Australia we need a new, fairer taxation system. The
Beazley / Evans approach ignores the national interests. It is all
about political point scoring.
5 July 1998