enforcer

An RX7 was impounded after allegedly racing at 170km/h through the Sydney airport tunnel over the weekend.

Repeat offenders would then have to watch their car destroyed in a supervised crash test.

I hate to say it, but anyone doing these speeds when drag racing on a public road deserve to lose their car....

http://news.ninemsn.com.au/article.aspx?id=384972

ds2000

Why crush the damn car? Its rare, send it off to auction

FC and FD numbers are low enough as it is

Rotor Convert

Don't crush the car...crush the human...

Now if the driver was shot out of a cannon into a wall at that speed then that might deter them......

Now I agree with you both...don't crush the FD..they are lovely to look at....punish the driver...sell the car on ebay to the highest bidder and give the $$ to the victims of crime fund.....

ds2000

^ exactly, or setup a fun for drivers that are hit by insured motorists and use that to compensate the insured folks. Throwing good cars away is just awful

mdr

Good on em.

I say auction the cars off and use the money from it to compensate accident victims.
Maybe if the fools lose their cars they will stop and think a little before they decide to lay the hammer down.

Revolver

Crushing the car is just wasteful of resources.

But you're kidding yourselves if you think selling them would make money available for worthy causes - this govt is so cash strapped it'd go straight into consolidated revenue!

170Km/h is nuts on a public road - especially a main road like that. Talk about the shallow end of the gene pool...

thisllub

This is typical of the moronic mentality of large sections of the media, government and police. Blame the car not the driver
The same goes for alcohol, drugs and gambling.

The response is to make laws that are tougher on those that obey them and do little or nothing to deter those that ignore them.

I agree with the auction idea.

Revolver, does trying to get away quickly from a set of traffic lights qualify as street racing or do speeds over the posted limit have to be involved?

matt13b

Idiots like this (although I did lose my license doing $140 in a 60 zone 10 years ago so I am a hypocrite) just give rotary drivers a worse reputation than they already have. I havn't lost a point since then touch wood and learnt my lesson but crushing the car is just a waste! There are so many track days and off street drags these days, and I going to theses days has really calmed my driving down and got it out of my system on the street,then again some people just shouldnt have powerful cars when they are really young, just like me when I was a teenager..

enforcer

Dave, we had a briefing today on the Federal Government postion on money...and its not good news. We're at the end of a 7 year GST cycle and all the States are being told to brace themselves for the worst - cutbacks.

It is a waste of money and the NSW government should consider auctioning the cars off, and diverting the monies into consolidated revenue...but that makes for good sense, which is the very reason why it wont happen...!

mdr

That make no sense since the Feds are running a 17 billion a year surplus.
But then again whom ever said politics made sense?

If some of these drivers lost their cars for more than 3 days many of them would think twice about racing on the street. Then again if we had more police maybe some of this could be stopped. Down here on the GC the police are so understaffed it is a joke. There are hoon hot spots and they know about them even have residents out taking pictures of them and giving them to the police and still nothing gets done. There is a round about on Gilston Rd. every Friday and Sat night turns into one big drift party and no one does a thing to stop them. Goes on for hours.

enforcer

Agreed mdr, but I couldn't also understand why the Howard government didn't spend its surplus on infrastructure, health and education rather than wasting it on tax cuts which got people up to their "eyeballs in debt", and then fix the problem by raising interest rates which is forcing us to change our lifestyle and freeze our own spending...

Heres part of the story...."With Labor's first budget now just three months away, the Business Council of Australia (BCA) has put forward its submission on what it would like to see in the budget.

In its budget submission, the BCA has attacked the Howard government for squandering almost all of the $87 billion in revenue from the mining boom.

It says the money went to tax cuts instead of critical infrastructure and in the process it fuelled inflation, and that's a view the Federal Treasurer Wayne Swan was quick to agree with.

The Business Council has issued a challenge to the Labor Government to not only show restraint in the upcoming budget, but for the next three years freeze spending.

http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2...25/2171824.htm

..and in Queensland were no better off!

http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2...23/2170732.htm

thisllub

I see it like this.

House prices are off the scale yet wages have hardly moved in a decade. Real inflation has been around 6% for about 5 years - only Chinese made plasma TVs , GMC tools and a rising dollar have kept inflation down.

The only way house prices can return to a sensible portion of income is for real estate to stop rising while wages do rise. Real estate can be kept in check by ending negative gearing and the capital gains discount. If the reserve bank targets 4-5% inflation interest rates and the dollar will come down. At 4% inflation it takes 20 years for wages to double, 15 at 5%.
Keating tried something similar in 1985 but the rental market in Sydney collapsed and he got rolled sparking another property boom.

At least the states are going to charge trucks more for abusing roads.

enforcer

...and with price increases across the board, a lot of people are going to be in for a world of hurt.

Conversely, US interest rates are going down....??????

The bottom line is I don't think we have a choice. Something has to be done to slow down the economy and bring housing back to realistic levels....

Revolver

I've not reviewed the amendments in question but my understanding is that if you perform a TLGP with another car, you can be booked even if you don't get over the limit - i.e. you're 'racing' someone, so you're street racing.

Drew, weigh in on this please. You must be more familiar with the definition of the offence...

Revolver

Not sure what you mean about a 7 year GST cycle (why is it cyclic??) but Labor campaigned heavily on reducing expenditure, so nobody can pretend surprise that they're going to introduce some spending cuts.

That said, GST is all paid to the states anyway (I think), so federal cuts shouldn't change that. Ahh, who the hell knows. We just have to bend over and cop it so ******** pollies can ponce about.

And what are you whinging about anyway?! You banana benders get more than your share of the GST we roaches pay!!

Revolver

Exactly!

enforcer

Not now we won't. Queensland and WA are the biggest earners of GST from Coal and Mining exports, and we both stand to lose something in the order of $2.7 billion dollars in the next three years.

Under the Intergovernmental Agreement that distributes all GST revenues to the States, the Commonwealth Grants Commission’s “fiscal equalisation” recommendations are based on a State whose revenue bases are
assessed to have grown faster than other States, or whose relative costs of providing a‘standard’ level of services has declined, will have its grant share cut.

The Grants Commission updates its calculation of State grant shares annually, using the latest available data. There is a significant lag between changes in our fiscal circumstances and changes in its grant share, as the Grants Commission uses a rolling five year average of States’ fiscal circumstances (my correction from earlier saying seven)

A large decline in Queensland GST grant share is projected over the forward estimates period, and reflects the lagged impact of the high growth in the State’s property market, related revenue and petroleum and mineral royalties. (e.g. our coal)

So in other words, the fastest growing states are having their GST revenue 'pulled back' to ensure all States get their equal share.

bennyaus

hey mate, your argument is technically flawed, i work for the ATO

There is NO GST imposed on exports.

for a supply to be a 'taxable supply' (ie there is gst on it) it needs to meet 4 criteria:
That the entity is registered or required to be registered for gst
that there is consideration provided
the entity is in enterprise
the supply is connected to australia.

they may be big GST earners, but not from exports.....

enforcer

This is the information we have been given, and in light of your association with the ATO, I won't doubt your word.

Are you in a position to comment (on the rationale provided) that Queensland will lose GST grants in the order of $2.7M over the next three years?

enforcer

I forgot to ask Bennyaus, are you interested in getting an RX8 or are you just cruising through.....?

bennyaus

Whats with the condecending tone??

Its fact, no gst on exports.

I'm not in treasury, i cant give any explanations as to how the GST is divvyd up. Im just an auditor.

I own a RX8, have done so for the last 6 months.

2003 VR leatherpack, spoiler, lip, etc.

Im on the rx8club.com.au site under benny, never registered for this site though.


Take it easy, even public servants do drive nice cars :D

JAT1

That is FUNNY is so many ways! We kinda already know that?!

Its ok mate im not having a go at you but there quite a few public servants around the forum from many different departments.

Revolver

Another ***-umption...

Revolver

That is an undisputed fact. The more interesting question is whether they deserve to?

My work brings me into contact with several who wouldn't know a hard day's work if it bit them on the ****.

Ahh, I do love a good generalisation...

enforcer

Benny you obviously don't know me too, but now you've opened an account on the dark side you soon will. The bottom line is I wasn't having a go at you at all.

Enough said on that, and a warm welcome to RX8club.com.

I'm also a public servant who likes to drive a nice car, and unlike some blue collar workers also work my '***' off to make ends meet....