Ideas@TheCentre
An NDIS tax?
Those who call for raising taxes to fund their pet projects and programs implicitly assume that all existing government spending is completely justifiable.
They also implicitly assume that there is no waste, no inefficiency, no superfluous program, and no possible spending reductions to fund their obsessions, hence warranting more taxes.
In short, arguments favouring increased taxation are also arguments defending current spending – and the Commonwealth will spend around $376 billion this year alone.
With the carbon tax and mining tax in effect, and the flood tax behind us, calls for more taxes to help fund the National Disability Insurance Scheme (NDIS) are starting to ring louder.
At the COAG meeting in July, Queensland Premier Campbell Newman suggested the Commonwealth should introduce a new tax like the Medicare levy to fund the NDIS.
At the next COAG meeting in December, the Commonwealth and the states will discuss how to pay for the NDIS, which will cost around $22 billion a year by 2018–19. I made the case that we can find money for the NDIS by going through government spending program by program and assessing this expenditure based on the services and supports the NDIS is supposed to provide.
Could the $4.5 billion spent on Family Tax Benefit Part B be better spent on supported accommodation for people with disability? Could the $850 million spent on the Baby Bonus be better spent on respite care for family carers? Could the $1.2 billion spent on the Schoolkids Bonus be better spent on wages for attendant carers? I think the answer to all these questions is yes.
These examples are just a few of the dozens of state and federal government programs that could be cut to fund the NDIS.
More money can be found in the billions the Commonwealth hands out in corporate welfare – abolishing subsidies for the auto industry would be a good start.
The ‘NDIS test’ could also be applied program by program in the states to find billions more to help fund the NDIS.
We should not be frightened of the $22 billion-a-year price tag for the NDIS. But we should be frightened by lazy politicians who lack the courage to make the tough decisions to cut spending and see the NDIS only as another opportunity to raise taxes.
Andrew Baker is a Policy Analyst at The Centre for Independent Studies and author of The New Leviathan: A National Disability Insurance Scheme.
