The Australian Council of Social Service (ACOSS) has called on the Government to implement a raft of measures, including taxes on alcohol and sugary drinks, as an alternative to budget cuts.
“After two years of chasing the ill-conceived 2014 Budget cuts, it’s time the Government recast its Budget strategy and moved on from the one-sided focus on spending cuts, particularly in social security,” said ACOSS CEO Dr Cassandra Goldie.
“ACOSS proposes a suite of measures that will save $9.4 billion by 2018-19 in addition to putting $4 billion into critical social infrastructure to reduce poverty and inequality in Australia.
“Australia is a low-spending country on social security, spending just 9% of GDP on welfare compared with the OECD average of 12.4%. We are also the sixth lowest taxing country of 34 OECD countries.”
The welfare group says the revenue accrued from the changes should be used to reform these welfare payments.
Specifically, ACOSS wants a ‘sugar tax’ on sweetened drinks that it says would save $500m in 2018-19. In addition, the organisation wants the Government to abolish the Wine Equalisation Tax and WET Rebate, and tax wine and ciders at (two) uniform rates. This, it says, would save $2,300m in 2018-19.
Goldie said that, apart from raising revenue, these measures “should improve public health and help ease future pressures on the health care system”.
Further measures proposed by ACOSS include changes to capital gains tax, deductions to negative gearing, removal of the private health insurance rebate, abolishing the extended Medicare safety net, and superannuation contribution reforms.