Article – Palmer United Party Senator-elect Jacqui Lambie urges special tax status for Tasmania

2 June 2014
Nick Clark
The Mercury

PHOTO: Jacqui Lambie says she will not negotiate with Prime Minister Tony Abbott over the Budget. (News Limited)

PALMER United Party Senator-elect Jacqui Lambie says she will not negotiate with Prime Minister Tony Abbott over the Budget.

Ms Lambie, who takes her seat on July 1, will be one of four senators whose vote will be critical to passing the Budget.
Sen Lambie’s rejection of negotiations comes after reports that Mr Abbott was in the process of meeting and negotiating with incoming senators including Liberal Democrat David Leyonhjelm, Democratic Labour Party member John Madigan, South Australian Family First member Bob Day and Motoring Enthusiast party member Ricky Muir.
“We are standing as a team and there will be no negotiations between Clive Palmer and the Prime Minister,” she said.
Ms Lambie said she was disappointed Mr Abbott had ignored letters for several months she had written about the plight of war veterans.
She said Tasmania needed to be a special economic zone where payroll tax was abolished with help from the Federal Government.
“We are in a crisis situation financially and I would expect every Liberal parliamentarian to support my calls,” she said.
“We are never going to get back on our feet the way we are going and we need to take some drastic measures down here.”
During the election campaign Mr Abbott talked of a special economic zone for Tasmania. However, he clarified his statement.
“I am talking about a special effort recognising Tasmania’s special circumstances to ensure we have a much stronger economy in the future than we have had in the recent past,” he said.
Mr Abbott said the special effort was not related to a special economic zone touted for Northern Australia.
Ms Lambie said the party was also opposed to the $7 GP co-payment and the indexing of pensions from 2017 to the consumer price index.
Another one of the party’s core issues was to drop the price for passengers and freight across Bass Strait.
“That needs to be dealt with under a special economic zone and I am sick of them tap dancing around it,” she said.
Ms Lambie said she would be voting to scrap the carbon tax despite its value to Hydro Tasmania and State Government coffers because it was one of their election promises.
Courtesy of The Mercury