Carnivorous Collins out for blood.
I wasn’t impressed with the Herald of Sunday article on child support. Judith Collins has obviously enlisted the help of some of our lame journalists, to promote her cause. Any journalist with an ounce of credibility would have had opposing views in their article. Perhaps the suggestion here is that there is no opposing point of view. Given that parliament has just passed new child support legislation why is Judith Collins running the big National Party campaign? It has just been debated in parliament. Collins is starting to run over that fine line the way she carries on about Deadbeat Dads and child support. Sounds to me like she is locked into some sort of high flying girls club who have been trying to get money off their ex under the child support legislation. That has nothing to do with families and children. That is just abusing your political position. It is more likely to be about the corporate bitch that didn’t have the best accountant.
In the mean time organisations like Parents for Children and Project Re-Union will continue to exist, and will work toward advocating for realistic legislation. If the world is a smaller place then we do not need to run years behind the rest of the world in social legislation. England for example has abandoned the same type of legislation that puts fathers in debt to the state — it doesn’t work.
I suspect the news about the child support Forum in Auckland next weekend and the conference in Wellington in January is starting to get around. This could be what is drawing Collins out on a limb. Given the list of press releases and articles Collins has produced recently you would be forgiven for thinking this was Nationals “Key” platform and she was in Election mode.
Beyond this you can see just how sad our political situation is when you look at the Families commission. They haven’t even worked out what they are meant to be doing, and they were right into the Labour party support role — abandon section 59. Did I miss the release about child support from them? So much for the independent voice for the family! Collins is family spokesperson. Did you see the family’s commission responding to all the press releases Collins has released lately on child support?
The biggest laugh of all is old Chuck Bird quitting Act and cuddling up to Collins. Is Collins recently separated or something?
Tut Tut. I see in this National Socialist propaganda rag that 94% of Australians are standing up for their legal rights: Well done all of you!!!
Below is a copy of Parts 1-3 of the Australian Child Support Assessment Act 1989 and thereafter, decisions from the High Court on Tax and the powers that the C$A have. They have the same rights you do.
An Act to make provision for determining the financial support payable by parents for their children, and for other purposes
Part 1-Preliminary
1 Short title [see Note 1]
This Act may be cited as the Child Support (Assessment) Act 1989.
2 Commencement [see Note 1]
(1) Subject to subsection (2), this Act commences on a day to be fixed by Proclamation.
(2) If this Act does not commence under subsection (1) within the period of 6 months beginning on the day on which it receives the Royal Assent, it commences on the first day after the end of that period.
3 Duty of parents to maintain their children
(1) The parents of a child have the primary duty to maintain the child.
(2) Without limiting subsection (1), the duty of a parent to maintain a child:
(a) is not of lower priority than the duty of the parent to maintain any other child or another person; and
(b) has priority over all commitments of the parent other than commitments necessary to enable the parent to support:
(i) himself or herself; and
(ii) any other child or another person that the parent has a duty to maintain; and
(c) is not affected by:
(i) the duty of any other person to maintain the child; or
(ii) any entitlement of the child or another person to an income tested pension, allowance or benefit.
Luton v Lessels (2002) 165 CLR 462 is a High Court of Australia case that affirms previous High Court definitions of a tax.
Case opinions:
(6:0) The scheme established by the Child Support (Registration and Collection) Act 1988 and the Child Support (Assessment) Act 1989 (Cth) for the collection and payment of money otherwise payable to or receivable by the recipient is not a tax (per Gleeson CJ, Gaudron, McHugh, Kirby, Hayne and Callinan JJ)
(6:0) The Acts do not infer on the Child Support Agency judicial power and are not offensive to the doctrine of separation of powers (per Gleeson CJ, Gaudron, McHugh, Kirby, Hayne and Callinan JJ)
I hope you all got to see your children and had heaps of fun in the pouring rain on this holiday weekend.
Regards
Freethinker.
Comment by Freethinker — Mon 23rd October 2006 @ 5:57 pm
Freethinker,
I would hardly use the words “rights” in relation to either the NZ or Aussies Child Support Tax Laws.
As to the question ; Is a compulsory levey on a defined group of citizens, at a predefined percentage ammount of gross income, that is administered and collected by IRD, and that Ministers and officals call a tax, actually a tax?
If it looks like a duck and quacks like a duck and walks like a duck only a lawyer could tell you its a seagull.
Regards
Scrap
Comment by Scrap_The_CSA — Mon 23rd October 2006 @ 7:34 pm
Hi Scrap
I don’t see the term ‘compulsory’ anywhere in the copy of the legislation or decisions by the High Court that I posted. The clues to your rights are in the wording….
Example:
(1) The parents of a child have the primary duty to maintain the child.
I Googled the word ‘duty’ and here is the definition from Wickipedia:
Duty is a term loosely applied to any action (or course of action) which is regarded as morally incumbent, apart from personal likes and dislikes or any external compulsion. Such action must be viewed in relation to a principle, which may be abstract in the highest sense (e.g. obedience to the dictates of conscience) or based on local and personal relations. That a father and his children have mutual duties implies that there are moral laws regulating their relationship; that it is the duty of a servant to obey his master within certain limits is part of a definite contract, whereby he becomes a servant engaging to do certain things for a specified wage. Thus, it is held that it is not the duty of a servant to infringe a moral law even though his master should command it. For the nature of duty in the abstract, and the various criteria on which it has been based, see ethics.
From the root idea of obligation to serve or give something in return, involved in the conception of duty, have sprung various derivative uses of the word; thus it is used of the services performed by a minister of a church, by a soldier, or by any employee or servant.
Many schools of thought have debated the idea of duty. While many assert mankind’s duty on their own terms, some philosophers have absolutely rejected a sense of duty (such as the Taoists).
Another example is the first 3 and last 4 words in one of the decisions by the High Court of Australia: The scheme established…is not a tax.
Next emample:
(6:0) The Acts do not infer on the Child Support Agency judicial power
This seems to me, only the Courts have power to enforce or judge.
This explains also why the Australian Taxation Office dropped their logo off of Child Support Agency correspondence. Major boo boo….the implications of this are enormous.
Regards
Freethinker
Comment by Freethinker — Mon 23rd October 2006 @ 11:39 pm