Chicken tax to raise poultry sums
Primary producers will pay a very small levy on chickens to repay the $1.85m that the government paid on behalf of the industry to help secure the borders from bird flu.
The levy is set at 3c each for chicken meat chicks and 1.4c for egg-laying chicks, so it is unlikely that consumers will feel the pinch when they buy their chicken parmas at the pub.
Chicken farmers aren’t the only primary producers to be slugged for biosecurity. Banana growers will be charged 75c per kilo to pay for the costs of tackling the devastating banana freckle fungus.
Honey producers will also be charged a levy for making and exporting the condiment, in order to help the bee industry meet its biosecurity obligations.
Citizens caned
What better way to welcome our newest citizen than to charge them top dollar for their citizenship? New Australians will be made to pay the full costs of their citizenship, from 1 January 2016. The revenue measure will raise just over $437m over four years.
Currently, applying for citizenship can cost anywhere up to $260, with concessions and exemptions available depending on the type of application.
Government match-making
It may sound like a dating website, but Match Australia is a business initiative that leverages trade opportunities off the back of international sporting events. The concept showcases Australia as a desirable trade destination at both domestic and overseas sporting events.
The program will receive a funding boost of $5.4m over four years, the costs of which will be met by scrapping a similar networking program, the Asian Business Engagement Plan.
Parliament is a dangerous place
The federal government has put aside a relatively modest sum of $1.4m over four years to create an injury compensation scheme for parliamentarians who might get injured while in the Big House or undertaking their duties in the electorate.
Just crunching the numbers here, but if each of the Commonwealth’s 226 members and senators makes a claim in the forward estimates period, they would get just shy of $6,200 each.
We are never, ever ever getting back together
After a rocky relationship with the electorate, the federal government has announced that it will divorce itself from its $17.2m relationship counselling vouchers once and for all.
Couples who have unspent vouchers, which can be used for marriage counselling or other relationship advice as part of the stronger relationships trial, can use them up until 30 June.
Won’t someone think of the children?
The government will provide $5m over two years for a communications campaign to raise awareness of the positive effect parental engagement has on their child’s education.
Just in case they had forgotten, of course.
