Andrew Leigh

The Australian Tax Office has confirmed that $2.7 billion of revenue was protected from being lost to the Black Economy in the 2015-16 financial year as a result of the Taxable Payment Reporting System introduced by Labor in the 2011-12 Budget.
 
To put this beyond doubt before the Coalition tries to steal credit: yesterday’s result is solely due to Labor’s tax integrity measures in the building and construction industry.

This result came on the same day the Coalition backed down in the House on their proposal to introduce a new tax loophole, which would have allowed taxpayers to self-assess depreciation schedules on intangible assets. Labor opposed it last year when the Coalition said it would cost the budget $80 million over the forward estimates. When they conceded and dropped the measure, the Coalition sheepishly admitted that the tax loophole had been recosted by Treasury as $425 million over the forwards. Without Labor holding the fiscal line, the budget would have been nearly half a billion dollars worse off.
 
Labor has welcomed the Coalition’s embrace of Labor’s Taxable Payment Reporting System reforms, including the expansion to other sectors of the economy such as courier and cleaning services.
 
But, as usual, it is Labor’s reforms and policy positions that are doing the heavy lifting. More often than not, the Liberals opposed Labor’s reforms.
 
It was Labor’s laws – opposed by the Liberals– that helped deliver the Tax Office’s $300 million win against Chevron in the High Court.
 
It was Labor’s laws – opposed by the Liberals – that underpinned the Tax Office’s $529 million settlement with BHP.
 
It is Labor’s laws – opposed by the Liberals – that delivered the majority of the $5.6 billion collected from multinationals and high net-worth individuals by an tax office taskforce. (The Government’s Multinational Anti-Avoidance Law only applies from 1 July 2016, but most of the $5.6 of assessments are for prior years).
 
All that the Coalition have left are lies. Yesterday, Stuart Robert lied – again –by claiming that Labor voted against the Government’s soft multinational laws. In fact, Labor supported that bill through both the House and the Senate.
 
The truth is, the Liberals have more than doubled net debt to record highs and seen gross debt crash through half-a-trillion dollars for the first time ever in the country’s history. Only Labor can tackle tax avoidance and pay down the Coalition’s record and growing debt.

ENDS

Authorised by Noah Carroll ALP Canberra.