Northern Territory GST Spending Attacked

The Victorian Government has attacked the NT's inability to effectively use the GST for its indigenous residents at the Treasury Heads meeting in Melbourne. As part of Victoria's attack on the GST redistribution arrangements in Australia it has said that the Territory's '... poor government policy has contributed to the situation indigenous people find themselves in.'

"The fact is that the Territory is spending half of all its revenues on indigenous people,” Shadow Indigenous Affairs Minister, Terry Mills said today.

"But the Territory is not spending it well. The Territory Government spends 49.7% of all its income on indigenous people. Nevertheless, the results are so poor the Victorian and New South Wales Governments are using those poor results to attack the GST redistribution arrangements nationally.

"Both New South Wales and Victoria have been trying to erode the arrangements in their favour. Part of the process of eroding the national arrangements includes attacking the smaller jurisdictions on their ability to manage those funds. This means that the Territory's poor management of these funds is adding fuel to the arguments posed by the bigger states.

"The problem for the NT is that there is an element of truth in what the bigger states are saying about the Territory's ability to manage the funds. We have seen increased spending from luxurious amounts of GST income for deteriorating results for indigenous people in the Territory.

"Now the Victorian and New South Wales Governments have called for the money for indigenous communities to be provided directly to the communities rather than via the Territory Government.

"I'm sure that the Chief Minister would love to divest herself of the responsibility for Indigenous issues but under the process advanced by her Labor mates in Melbourne and Sydney the Territory would end up losing sovereignty for about half of its land mass, permanently.”

2006-08-01