Re: Affect of GST on Rail.

[Vaughan Williams <ender2000@my-deja.com>]

(since the
> major cost for road users is fuel,which wont change.)

The price of diesel is changing significantly under GST/ANTS.
For rail, there will be a 100% excise rebate - meaning rail operators
effectively get their fuel tax-free.

For trucks over 20t, and smaller trucks operating in rural areas,
diesel goes down in price by about 30c a litre (I think).

There are also a whole lot of subsidies to convert trucks to gas put
into the package by the Democrats as sweeteners, but the final outcome
is that diesel becomes a lot cheaper, and so people worry less about
fuel efficiency - which means rail loses one of its main advantages
over road.

The original package, pre-Democrats, didn't have the 100% rail rebate
and so rail did even worse out of it - because they paid the same price
as road for their fuel on top of losing the competitive advantage of
fuel efficiency. According to the A.R.A, this would have destroyed rail
as a viable transport option in most parts of australia (for example,
the adelaide - melbourne line would have closed)

The Democrat-modified ANTS is only slightly better. Rail and Gas, the
two industries the Dems wanted to protect, will be struggling just to
stand still.

I'm not sure if GST applies or not to track access charges.

It does apply to passenger fares - which will, of course, encourage
ever more urban australians back to their cars.
Shame on you, Howard and Lees!

Vaughan

> Theoretically the Railways could try to pass the increased costs onto
their
> customers,but one wonders how long they would then have any customers
> given that the customers could switch to road where the costs wont
change.
>
> >GST is a value-added tax
> where each link in the sale chain deducts the>value of GST on its
purchases
> and pays it on its sales, with the full>tax in effect being only paid
by the
> (retail) end user.
>
> >David McLoughlin
> >Auckland New Zealand
>
> MD
>
>


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