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Business View Australia - August 2015 119
from major development companies
to one-man operations. The big
companies need the one-man
operations because one day the big
companies might buy them and the
one-man companies need the big
ones because they can see what
sort of activity is taking place in the
market.
“We made a conscious decision to
have a broad membership and not just
have massive companies but to get
that right mix.
“There isacompanycalledGreenfields
Property Development, who are
developing the biggest ever project in
New South Wales. Twenty years ago,
Tony Perich, who is the owner, was a
farmer. Now he is major developer. He
met Laurie Rose two decades ago at
one of our functions. Laurie’s been
doing Tony’s work ever since. They are
great business partners and this goes
to show how a simple meeting at an
event can create a lot of synergies and
some good business relationships.”
The UDIA is a common voice for the
urbandevelopment industry. It regularly
takes up causes which will serve to
promote efficient development and
advises the federal government on the
steps that are required to be taken.
One of the issues being championed
by UDIA is the need to shift away from
inefficient taxes such as stamp duty
and the requirement for developers
to pay substantial amounts as initial
development fees.
The Institute has made a detailed
submission to the government
describing how the inefficient tax
system is proving to be detrimental
to economic growth and prosperity. It
has made the case that the imposition
of stamp duty results in reduced
labour mobility and productivity by
tying down people to a particular
location. Inefficient taxes also result in
the reduction of new housing projects
thereby leading to an increase in the
prices of existing residential units.
A strong argument has been made
for replacing these inefficient levies
with GST and taxes on the value of
land, which are considered a vastly
better option and which would result
in increasing the pool of housing
available over a period of time.
The National President of UDIA, Mr.
Cameron Shephard has urged the
government to take up this important
issue, “A great deal of Australia’s
economic potential is being held back
and squandered by a tax system that
has failed to keep up with the times.
Phasing out stamp duty in favour of a
broader based GST, and broad based
PERTY DEVELOPMENT