Andrew Leigh

4 June 2014

The Excise Tariff Amendment (Product Stewardship for Oil) Bill 2014 will increase the rate of excise and excise equivalent customs duty applying to oils from 5.449 to 8.5 cents per litre or kilogram to address the cost of the Product Stewardship for Oil Scheme. The kinds of oils to which this would apply, as I understand, are oils like kerosene, turpentine and thinners. The opposition supports any move to ensure thoughtful and sustainable use of our precious natural resources. The Product Stewardship for Oil Scheme—the PSO—encourages increased collection and recycling of used oil in Australia by providing oil recyclers with product stewardship benefits.

4 June 2014

The Tax and Superannuation Laws Amendment (2014 Measures No. 2) Bill 2014 has three parts. It increases the Medicare levy low-income threshold, the point at which the levy starts to be paid, for families and their dependent children or students, in line with movements in the CPI, commencing in 2013-14. It contains amendments to protect against situations where taxpayers have anticipated the impact of announcements made by the previous government in regard to tax law which have been overturned by the current government and as a result have been left worse off—this is taxpayers who have filed tax returns; lest any listeners think this might have broader applicability. Thirdly it is to introduce an integrity rule to limit the ability of taxpayers to avoid paying tax by dividend-washing, which is a taxation loophole created by the tax treatment of franking credits.

4 June 2014

In March 2010 the United States Congress enacted the Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act, also known as FATCA. The aim of the act was to improve compliance with US tax laws. FATCA imposed certain due diligence and reporting obligations on non-US financial institutions, including Australian institutions. Two years after the passing of FATCA, the member for Lilley, Wayne Swan, the then Treasurer, met with United States Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner in Washington and issued a statement on 7 November 2012 announcing that Australia had commenced formal discussions for an intergovernmental agreement with the United States to minimise the impact for Australians of FATCA. That statement noted that an intergovernmental agreement would also improve existing reciprocal tax information-sharing arrangements between the Australian Taxation Office and the United States Internal Revenue Service, which would help ensure Australian tax laws are effectively enforced so that Australian businesses and individuals who pay their fair share of tax are not disadvantaged by those who seek to evade their tax obligations.

4 June 2014

Labor believes strongly that the mining industry has an important part to play in Australia's economic prosperity. The shadow Treasurer was indeed just commenting to me during the division about his recent visit to the Santos control centre in Brisbane, and I have enjoyed many productive conversations with Australia's miners. Mining constituted 80 per cent of the growth in the last quarter, giving a lie to those who have run a scare campaign suggesting that a profits based mining tax would debilitate the mining industry.

Ahead of an Economics Committee Senate estimates hearing this morning, Bernie Ripoll and I put out a joint release raising concern about budget cuts to ASIC and the ATO. 

THE HON BERNIE RIPOLL MP

SHADOW MINISTER FOR FINANCIAL SERVICES & SUPERANNUATION

MEMBER FOR OXLEY

 

ANDREW LEIGH MP
SHADOW ASSISTANT TREASURER

SHADOW MINISTER FOR COMPETITION
MEMBER FOR FRASER

MEDIA RELEASE

ABBOTT GOVERNMENT SENDS WRONG MESSAGE TO TAX DODGERS AND CORPORATE CRIMINALS

It’s never been to a better time for tax dodgers and white collar criminals as the Abbott Government slashes staff at the Australian Tax Office and hits resources available to the corporate watchdog, the Australian Securities and Investment Commission.

The Coalition talks about the importance of the rule of law, but 3000 fewer ATO jobs and swingeing cuts to ASIC will lead to the rule of the jungle. 

Today in the Parliament I spoke about the Government's decision to axe the Australian Interactive Games Fund.

It was my pleasure this morning, with the shadow Attorney-General Mark Dreyfus, to meet with Adam Boyle and Tony Lawrence, from 2K Australia, to discuss the government's axing of the Australian Interactive Games Fund. This was a $10 million cut from the budget. That is a small amount when compared to what this government has cut out of health and education, but it is a significant cut when it comes to the nascent Australian gaming industry. 

Today I spoke in the Parliament about the impact of the Government's health cuts on the ACT.

The ACT will be hard hit by the federal budget. From July, these cuts will see ACT health funding drained of a much needed $47 million. Over the next four years, Canberrans will see more than $240 million cut from health funding. As Chief Minister Katy Gallagher has stated, the cuts to health funding equates to the staffing of 135 acute hospital beds, 390 nurses or 2,850 elective surgery operations.

Yesterday in the Parliament I spoke on the great Australian economist Fred Gruen.

Fred Henry George Gruen was born in 1921 in Vienna, Austria. He came to Australia after the outbreak of World War II on the Dunera and was then classified as an enemy alien. But he went on to be one of the great Australian economists. Fred Gruen worked initially as a professor of agriculture economics at Monash and bought a farm in Melbourne. He said in the early years at Monash that he was ‘one lecture ahead of the students and one fence ahead of the cattle’. 

In my usual Monday slot with Breaking Politics host, Chris Hammer, today's topics included another gaffe by the Education Minister, Christopher Pyne, and concern this Governent does not understand its own budget and the budget's ripple effects.

E&OE TRANSCRIPT

BREAKING POLITICS – FAIRFAX MEDIA
MONDAY, 2 JUNE 2014
CANBERRA

SUBJECT / S: Higher education changes; Crippling cuts to CSIRO and other science organisations; D-Day commemorations and the Prime Minister’s partisanship; Welfare payment changes and drug testing recipients.

CHRIS HAMMER: Joining us now is  Andrew Leigh the shadow assistant treasurer and Labor member for Fraser.

SHADOW ASSISTANT TREASURER, ANDREW LEIGH: Good Morning Chris.

HAMMER: Good Morning. Now Christopher Pyne says that the new university system, the new university fees won't kick in til June 2016. So what’s the problem, people have plenty of warning of what’s coming?

LEIGH: Well the question that Minister Pyne was asked yesterday Chris, was when the changes to the indexation of HECS debts would start. He erroneously said that would begin applying only to new enrolees. In fact it applies to students currently enrolled, and even students who have graduated, a measure which smells a whole lot like retrospective taxation to me, although I suspect that its constitutionally possible to get it through. It means that a student that graduated maybe even a decade ago is now going to see their HECS debt balloon if they don't begin paying it off rapidly. It was an approach that was never envisaged from the start when HECS was put in place.

 

On 22 May 2014, I interviewed Jeffrey Sachs, Director of the Earth Institute at Columbia University, about the role of Australian aid in reducing global poverty.