Independent Senator Nick Xenophon [pictured] writes:
The Government and Liberal Senators voted together to defeat a Greens motion by Senator Christine Milne to ban the tax breaks.
This policy is an act of folly. It is bad for farmers, it is bad for the water market, and it is bad for the environment.
The tax breaks give Managed Investments Schemes an unfair advantage over ordinary farmers.
These tax breaks distort the market. The Investment Schemes end up cashed up and this drives up the price of land and water and it threatens the security of our food production.
The scheme also makes a mockery of the government’s Water Bill. Many of these carbon sinks will actually stop water reaching the rivers.
The tax breaks as divisive and unfair.
Under this system you can have two farms side by side. The one run by the Investment Fund gets a tax break that allows them to write off the entire cost of their tree plantings, their buildings, their machinery, and their vehicles in the first year of operation. The ordinary farmer next door doesn’t get the same tax break and has to write his costs off over decades.
Tax dollars are being used to give big business an advantage over ordinary farmers.
I pay tribute to Nationals Senator Barnaby Joyce and his three party colleagues, Senators Nash, Boswell and Williams for crossing the floor on this issue. The four Nationals voted with Senator Xenophon, the Greens and Senator Fielding.
Barnaby is on the money, and this clearly is a waste of taxpayers’ money.
END
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