Sydney? Harbour and Opera House. Melbourne? Heritage-listed car parks — ABC
Free market think tank the Centre for Independent Studies (CIS) does have some fun occasionally and it seems like today is the day.
Its self-generated list of heritage listing decisions that it says are given to “buildings and structures of dubious aesthetic or historical merit” has an absolute cracker at the top, a seven-storey carpark on the corner of Grattan and Cardigan streets in Carlton, Victoria.
‘Run amok’: Centre for Independent Studies unveils most controversial heritage listings in inaugural ‘Heritage Howler’ awards — Sky News
A think tank has revealed Australia’s most controversial heritage listings in its first-ever “Heritage Howler” awards, amid claims the system has “run amok”.
The gongs have been handed out by the Centre for Independent Studies (CIS), the same organisation behind the annual “Nanny State Awards”.
Speaking to Sky News host Chris Kenny, CIS chief economist Peter Tulip said the heritage system has “run amok”.
“Australia’s got a housing crisis, and part of the problem is that we’re locking away a lot of unremarkable, and in some cases, ugly buildings. They are being preserved by the heritage system,” he said on Tuesday.
“It’s partly stopping the new housing, but often what is being preserved isn’t especially remarkable or interesting.
“Nobody disagrees with preserving really old or really important buildings, or attractive buildings, but that is not what’s happening.
“The heritage system has run amok, and they are preserving a lot of ugly buildings.”
Bronze: MLC Building in North Sydney
I think they asked ‘if you turned a filing cabinet into an office block, how would it look’? Mr Tulip said.
“This building is preserved for its architectural distinctiveness. To me, it looks like two rectangles jammed together.”
Silver: Electricity substations in Merri-bek, Melbourne, and Leichhardt, Inner West Sydney
These two buildings were heritage listed for their “historical significance and association with the establishment and development of the Brunswick electricity supply network.”
Mr Tulip disagrees, adding: “I think an electricity substation is one of the very few buildings that’s actually improved by letting teenagers run wild with their spray cans.
“One of the purposes of the heritage system, if it were working well, would be to preserve attractive buildings and increase neighbourhood amenity.
“I think preserving electricity substations does the exact opposite.”
Gold: Carlton’s tall carpark, Victoria
This seven-storey structure was listed for its “local aesthetic and significance representative value”, and for being “striking, robust and bold.”
“A multi-storey carpark, I think, is even uglier than an electricity substation,” Mr Tulip added.
Tax burden on Australians at highest level in two decades, with former RBA official warning it might get worse — The West
“That leads a more than one-for-one increase in State government stamp duty receipts,” Dr Tulip said as the chief economist with the Centre for Independent Studies.
‘Something has to give’: Australia faces impossible dilemma as fiscal cliff looms — across NewsCorp
“We’ve had an expansion of the size of government over the past 10-15 years … this is clearly crowding out the private sector, and because a lot of the so-called care economy is low productivity, overall productivity is falling,” said Michael Stutchbury, executive director of the Centre for Independent Studies (CIS) and former editor-in-chief of The Australian Financial Review.
“That’s not a recipe for increasing living standards or increasing wages.”
Mr Stutchbury said there had now been three “burning platforms” that should have prompted major reforms — the GFC, the pandemic and now the Middle East oil crisis.
“You wonder what it takes to get a serious budget repair and productivity agenda up,” he said.
“Our prosperity peaked in 2011 when iron ore peaked at $US180 a tonne, we’ve really been drifting since then.
“Now we find not only we’ve got an ageing population, but we’re going to have to spend more on defence, national sovereignty in terms of supply chains … it can drift for quite a while, the budget deficit keeps on being sustained, interest payments go up and your capacity for growth in national income is constrained, so purchasing power and wages can’t increase.
“There’s no real way out of this unless we either get more productive and more efficient, or we get another big bout of good luck.”
Mr Stutchbury said Labor’s proposed tax tweaks, such as ending the 50 per cent capital gains tax discount for property investors, were couched as “intergenerational equity” even as future generations would be left paying the interest bill on government borrowing.
“The real driver of this is to raise more revenue, which gets to the basic point,” he said.
Budget papers forecast deficits for at least the next decade, with the gap only being closed by bracket creep — a “stealth” tax increase as inflation pushes workers into higher tax brackets.
“That’s the pickle we’re in — it’s a tough situation for a budget and a Treasurer to have to face,” Mr Stutchbury said.
“The productivity options would require full-blooded tax reform which we don’t really see a political appetite for, or a real winding back of excess red tape, or winding back the re-regulation of the labour market.
“There’s no real signals of a serious effort to cut back government spending. There will be a lot of talk about savings here and there but no real talk of winding back the size of government. We haven’t had that in Australia coming up on 30 years.
“These things build up over time and all the political promises that are made, give you more of this, more of that, really they’re borrowing that from the future. Sooner or later the future catches up with you.”
Autistic people on NDIS claim they are being made ‘scapegoats’ for scheme’s failures — across NewsCorp
Senior Fellow at the Centre for independent Studies and Prof. of Clinical Psychology Steven Schwartz said there are some children who have been diagnosed with autism who are “just basically shy” and that labelling them at such a young age is “almost a sin.” He sympathised with parents who have been forced to get a diagnosis for their child as the only way to get help.
The mental health system may be making us sicker — Health Services Daily
Despite decades of soaring expenditure, our national mental health has not improved, Steven Schwartz writes. Suicide rates remain stubbornly high. Psychiatric drug use is at record levels. And each year, more Australians are diagnosed as mentally ill than the year before.
Australia’s debt hits $1 trillion this year … what did we spend it on? — across Fairfax
One sharp critic of the situation is Robert Carling, a senior fellow at the right-leaning Centre for Independent Studies.
“Sadly, there’s not a lot to show for $1 trillion in debt,” he said.
Carling agrees the two big crises since 2006 have played a part, saying that an increase in overall debt was inevitable.
“But if you believe in the budget being a macroeconomic stabilisation tool, then you have deficits but you also run surpluses in better economic times,” he said.
“There have only been three budget surplus years since 2006-07. So this is a structural problem, not a cyclical one.”
According to Carling, the increase in spending on services such as the NDIS, aged care, education and childcare have been the biggest factors in the run-up in debt.
Tax revenue as a share of the economy has varied little, he said, dismissing some criticism that tax cuts had contributed to the $1 trillion debt pile.
All the extra spending and debt, while providing more services, had come at a steep macroeconomic cost to the country.
“The steady accumulation of debt and deficits has meant higher interest rates and an exchange rate than would otherwise have been,” he said.
As Carling notes, the NDIS is a huge weight on the budget. Spending on people with disabilities – which includes the NDIS and income support for those with disabilities – has climbed almost 600 per cent since 2007.
Who will pay the piper — Sydney Morning Herald
Robert Carling from the Centre for Independent Studies doesn’t think there is a lot to show for a trillion-dollar debt, then in the same breath goes on to say that most of it has gone towards the NDIS, aged care, education and child care. Yep, nothing much to show for it at all, Mr Carling. Is it any wonder people don’t think a lot of many economists? Gerald Smith, Adelaide (SA)
ALP plan will reduce power reliability, increase costs and fire-up diesel generators — The Australian
I worked in collaboration with Aidan Morrison of the Centre for Independent Studies; Aidan made a similar contribution to this commentary.
Aidan Morrison spoke to Sky TV’s Caleb Bond re refinery fire
Aidan Morrison spoke to Sky TV’s Peta Credlin re renewables/AEMC