Wayne Swan (Lilley, Australian Labor Party, Treasurer) Share this | Hansard source

Sometimes it is oranges and apples. He is just flip-flopping all over the place. Let us just go through a few of the basic facts. We have been having a debate about effective tax rates for companies. Those opposite have sided with the mining industry who are claiming an effective rate for the mining industry of something like 27c when the headline statutory rate is 30c. What has really stung them is that there is a Treasury study that points conclusively to the fact that the effective tax rate for the mining industry is 17c in the dollar. What he wants to leave out in all of these comparisons in his usually sloppy way is the fact that mining companies get very, very generous tax concessions. So he does his calculations based on taxable income—that is, taxable income after they have had all of those concessions. Their effective rate is 17c in the dollar. It does not matter how much you want to flip-flop all over the place and change the tax basis to make your point—

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