Video: Taxed Out Michael Hocking's speech on GAIC Tax: Melbourne Rally 14 July 2009

One of several speeches made at Melbourne 14 July 2009 rally against undemocratic rezoning of green wedges to benefit developers by making it possible to continue high immigration by providing housing at the expense of wildlife, open spaces and democracy.

The speaker is Michael Hocking of Taxed Out. The GAIC tax proposed is quite medieval, like a tax on peasants to benefit lords, which is how the feudal system worked. Where modern practice in the anglophone land-tenure systems is to tax developers the windfall they make on rezoned land, the GAIC tax would tax landowners if they sold land which had been rezoned against their wishes. The choice is a Hobson's one; if you stay you pay very high rates based on the theoretical value of resale. Hard to stay under the circumstances. A recipe for driving farmers and wildlife out and ushering suburbia in. A policy driven by the Growth Lobby.