Robert Carling on CGT, and more

Rents will surge if CGT discount goes, warns REIA — AFR

Former NSW Treasury official and senior fellow at the Centre for Independent Studies Robert Carling said there was “no strong case” for reducing the discount to 25 per cent, and argued that limited housing supply was a “much more important” contributor to high house prices than the CGT discount.

Carling also rejected suggestions the discount be only applied to new housing. “Discouraging investment in existing housing and favouring new construction is like dismissing trading in shares and bonds on the secondary market and only valuing new share or bond issues,” he said.

Centre for Independent Studies senior fellow Robert Carling also argued that cutting the CGT discount would reduce rental numbers.

Mr Carling, who previously worked at the Commonwealth Treasury, NSW Treasury, World Bank and the International Monetary Fund, said that improving home ownership required tackling the “high cost of building houses and apartments.” Also adding to the problem were regulations, “very demanding” building standards and high labour costs, along with council development restrictions.

In December the Sydney Morning Herald and the Age stopped disclosing that the conservative columnist Parnell Palme McGuinness is a senior fellow at the rightwing thinktank the Centre for Independent Studies. Her byline referred to her simply as “an independent insights and advocacy strategist”.

After we approached Nine, the publisher said it was a “production error” and the CIS disclosure would be added in future in print, and online articles would be amended.

McGuinness’s online bio is now pretty comprehensive: “Parnell Palme McGuinness is an insights and advocacy strategist. She has done work for the Liberal Party and the German Greens and is a senior fellow at the Centre for Independent Studies.

Deputy Opposition Leader Jane Hume, Opposition Leader Angus Taylor and former prime minister John Howard at the Centre for Independent Studies.

The following day, in an address to the right-wing Centre for Independent Studies (CIS), Taylor said: “This is Labor prioritising net zero ideology.”

These days Tom Switzer writes articles for The Australian, presents the podcast Switzerland (covering politics, modern history and international relations) and is the author of the recently published monograph Events, Dear Boy: How Any Government Can Be Derailed (Centre for Independent Studies).