Andrew Leigh

Joe Hockey's tax disclosure wind-back is a 'reform' nobody asked for, The Guardian, 21 August

This week’s Parliamentary sittings began with the tabling of a Senate report into how some big companies are dodging their tax bills. The report found that billions of dollars are draining offshore through holes in the tax system. It called for better tax transparency to hold companies accountable for shirking their fair share.

Asked on ABC radio what the government was doing about the problem, Treasurer Joe Hockey pointed out that a law requiring the tax office to disclose the tax paid by large firms was about to come into effect. What he didn’t say was that he was about to gut that law.

The Parliamentary week has ended with the Abbott Government introducing a bill to help some of Australia’s biggest companies keep their tax dealings secret. This means we’ll never know just how much dodging they may be getting away with. Far from backing better transparency, the Abbott Government is actually working to shield huge firms from any public scrutiny.

The Coalition’s bill is designed to eviscerate transparency laws Labor put in place in 2013. Labor’s laws require the Australian Tax Office to publish information about the income and tax paid by companies earning more than $100 million.

MATTER OF PUBLIC IMPORTANCE

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES,CANBERRA

THURSDAY, 20 AUGUST 2015

Recently scientists have been exploring a creature known as the sea squirt. It is a fascinating creature. It is a simple creature whose job in life is to try and locate a place on the sea floor, where it will sit and feed for the remainder of its life. It takes a little while to discover that place, but once it does, it begins absorbing parts of its body. It absorbs its tail, its eye, its spine and, finally, it eats its brain. That’s right, the sea squirt gets to where it wants to be and then eats its own brain.

I am sure I not the only one in this House who, when I hear about the sea squirt, starts to think about the history of the Abbott government. They had a brain that was devoted to getting where they needed to be and, once they gained power, they just ate their own brain. 

Tax and Superannuation Laws Amendment (2015 Measures No. 2) Bill 2015 

Second Reading Speech

19 August 2015 

I say at the outset that the opposition supports this bill, which contains four schedules. Schedules 1, 3 and 4 are non-controversial, technical changes with no fiscal impact. Schedule 1 provides tax relief for certain mining arrangements. Schedule 3 deals with income tax look-through treatment for instalment warrants and similar arrangements. Schedule 4 deals with certain categories of company losses.

Schedule 2 is the material schedule of the bill; it increases the statutory effective life of in-house software from four years to five years. This means that deductions will be claimed over five years for expenditure allocated to software development pools. The measure is recognition of the fact that software developed in-house has a longer effective life now than it had in the past. The saving is not inconsiderable—$420 million over the forward estimates.

IT’S OFFICIAL – GOVERNMENT’S TOP TAX PRIORITY IS GUTTING TRANSPARENCY

The Abbott Government has today shown that its top priority on tax is helping big companies keep secret how much they really pay. 

In the very same week a major Senate report has called for better tax transparency, the Abbott Government has introduced legislation to gut Australia’s existing tax transparency laws.

This morning, Assistant Treasurer Josh Frydenberg will table a bill that will roll back Labor’s transparency rules, introduced in 2013.

These laws require the Australian Tax Office to publish information about the income and tax paid by companies earning over $100 million a year.

Joe Hockey was spruiking these very rules on ABC Radio just three days ago when arguing against the need for better transparency.

ABBOTT’S CUTS LEAD CSIRO TO SELL THE FARM – LITERALLY

Australia’s premier research agency has been forced to turn property developer to make up for the Abbott Government’s deep funding cuts.

Today, the CSIRO announced it is seeking approval to re-develop a major tract of land in Canberra that has previously been used for agricultural research.

The agency has asked the National Capital Authority to re-zone the Ginninderra Field Station Site on the Barton Highway as 'Urban Area' in the next amendment to the National Capital Plan, due out next year. This would allow CSIRO to sell or build on the site for commercial development.

CSIRO would not need to sell off its assets if the Abbott Government hadn’t slashed $115 million from its funding in the 2014 Budget.

E&OE TRANSCRIPT

RADIO INTERVIEW

RADIO NATIONAL DRIVE

TUESDAY, 18 AUGUST 2015

SUBJECT/S: Marriage equality; Dyson Heydon; EPBC Act.

PATRICIA KARVELAS: We're joined in our Parliament House studio by Shadow Assistant Treasurer, Dr Andrew Leigh – hi Andrew.

ANDREW LEIGH, SHADOW ASSISTANT TREASURER: G'day Patricia.

KARVELAS: And the New South Wales Liberal Senator Arthur Sinodinos. Hi Arthur.

ARTHUR SINODINOS, SENATOR FOR NEW SOUTH WALES: Hi Patricia.

KARVELAS: Let's start with you, Arthur Sinodinos: why do frontbenchers need the riot act read to them? What's going wrong?

SINODINOS: Because last week we had a process of discussion in the party room on same-sex marriage which came to a disposition, which later became a decision, about a process for allowing the people to have a vote on this in the next Parliament. So then what happened afterwards is that various frontbenchers were out there, before there'd been a Cabinet discussion, giving their view about the form in which this consultation of the people should occur. What the Prime Minister was indicating, I think, in the party room today was that this is not the appropriate way to go about it and with the Canning by-election coming our way very soon, we need to make sure we are speaking with one voice and restoring Cabinet government so we can get on with focusing on the things that matter most to the people of Australia.

KARVELAS: But I've got to ask, Arthur Sinodinos, is there a position? You don't really have one yet – there’s only a sort of half position.

SINODINOS: The undertaking the Prime Minister gave to the party room was to come back with a process after consulting the Cabinet, and bring it to the party room in the next little while. I think that means, probably, when we're next sitting again.

Voluntary Euthanasia 

17 August 2015 

House of Representatives 

Jay Franklin lives in constant pain and has all his life. He has a congenital bowel disease known as Hirschsprung disease. As a result, his pelvic cavity is riddled with infection, even after more than 100 operations. In 2013, the Victorian man announced his plans to buy a one-way ticket to Switzerland where he was to receive life-ending medication. However, because of the severity of his condition doctors were unsure if his digestive system would be able to absorb the drugs that were intended to end his life. They were concerned the drugs might, instead, leave him in a vegetative state. Jay decided not to board the plane to Switzerland. Instead, he became a passionate advocate for voluntary euthanasia in Australia, running as a Victorian state candidate for the Voluntary Euthanasia Party in 2014.

Popular opinion in Australia is clear on this issue. A 2009 Newspoll survey found that 85 per cent of Australians support or advocate for voluntary euthanasia. Another Newspoll survey three years later garnered near identical results. Nearly one in four of those surveyed in the 2012 poll would even change their vote if the candidate they otherwise would have voted for was opposed to assisted dying law reform. Three out of four Catholics, four out of five Anglicans and over nine out of 10 Australians with no religion say they, in principle, support voluntary euthanasia. There is almost no difference across age groups, with middle-aged people being those who favour voluntary euthanasia the most, and limited differences across political parties. In 2012 the Australia Institute released their national survey of 1,422 people, also finding 71 per cent support voluntary euthanasia.

It was a pleasure to be able to move a motion on the great work being done by the Indigenous Marathon Project to promote active and healthy lifestyles in Indigenous communities. 

Indigenous Marathon Project Motion

17 August 2015 

 I move:

That this House:

(1) notes that:

(a) established in 2010, the Indigenous Marathon Project (IMP) plays a valuable role in promoting healthy lifestyles in Indigenous communities, creating Indigenous role models and inspiring Indigenous people;

(b) the IMP is part of the Indigenous Marathon Foundation (IMF), a health promotion charity that changes lives through running and that celebrates and showcases incredible Indigenous achievement and resilience;

(c) through the IMP, young Indigenous men and women aged from 18 to 30 are given the opportunity to unearth their own sense of self-worth and pride by completing a full marathon;

(d) participants in the IMP mostly train in their communities, attending four one-week training and education camps, and must complete a Certificate III in Fitness, acquire a Sports Aid Certificate and attain both Level I and II Accreditation in Recreational Running Coaching with Athletics Australia;

(e) the capstone achievement of the IMP is for participants to represent their families and communities and complete the biggest marathon in the world, in the biggest city in the world, the famous New York City Marathon held each November;

(f) in the last five years, the IMP has successfully graduated 43 Aboriginal and Torres Strait Island men and women with 11 more enrolled in this year's program, coming from remote communities, regional towns and major cities;

(g) most of these IMP graduates had never run before, but in just six months, had all run a full 42.2 kilometre marathon, with the motto 'the harder the struggle, the greater the reward', which builds self-worth and self-belief by setting difficult goals and achieving them; and

(h) in communities around Australia, graduates of the IMP have continued to run, established running and walking groups and organised hundreds of 'Deadly Fun Runs' each year that encourage local communities to lead active lifestyles and help reduce the incidence of disease and social dysfunction; and

(2) commends the work of Rob de Castella and his team in helping to change lives through the IMF and the IMP.

E&OE TRANSCRIPT

ONLINE INTERVIEW

FAIRFAX BREAKING POLITICS

MONDAY, 17 AUGUST 2015

SUBJECT/S: Marriage equality; Tax transparency; Environmental Protection Act.

CHRIS HAMMER: Andrew Leigh, given that it appears that it's unlikely there will be a vote in Parliament on same-sex marriage and there's now a debate about plebiscites verses referendums before, during or after the election, where do you think we should head?

ANDREW LEIGH, SHADOW ASSISTANT TREASURER: Chris, I think people are making this more complicated than it needs to be. When the Marriage Act was changed in 2004 to prevent same-sex marriage, none of the conservatives – Tony Abbott included – said that that should go to the people. The talk now of a plebiscite or referendum is just a delaying tactic, a blocking tactic which is, as today's polls show, against the wishes of two-thirds of Australians.

HAMMER: It's not a scuttling tactic?

LEIGH: It's probably that as well. But this is not a reform which ought to be threatening to Australians. This will strengthen traditional marriages, not weaken them. It will put us in the position of following the rest of the advanced countries in the English speaking world – countries like New Zealand, Britain, Ireland and the United States where the forecast plagues of locusts have not materialised since same-sex marriage has been allowed. 

JOE AND JOSH PRESS THE PANIC BUTTON AS TAX INACTION LAID BARE

 Joint media release with Shadow Treasurer Chris Bowen

The Abbott Government is a shambles on multinational tax, as ministers desperately try to hide their inaction on making multinationals pay their fair share.

Later today the Senate’s corporate tax inquiry will table a report which lays bare the worrying scale of tax avoidance by big multinationals. 

Joe Hockey and Josh Frydenberg have been out spinning hard in response, but they can’t even get their own policies straight.