Bob Baldwin (Paterson, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Defence Science and Personnel) Share this | Hansard source

My question is to the Prime Minister. I refer the Prime Minister to claims by the Hunter Business Chamber, a chamber that represents 1,000 businesses in the Hunter Valley, that 15,000 people are directly employed and another 50,000 indirectly employed in the region’s mining sector and that the Hunter economy is dependent upon the resources sector. Is he aware of a newspaper article on 3 May where it said in the Newcastle Herald that the 40 per cent tax on coal profits has Hunter coal companies ‘up in arms’ over the blatant tax grab and that effects of the super tax touch every level of the sector? The Herald said:

Hunter mines exported about $8 billion worth of coal last year, plus another $1 billion or more in domestic sales, and contributed about $900 million in state mining royalties.

On these figures, the Hunter’s contribution to the new “super tax” could be as much as $3 billion a year.

Prime Minister, what action is your government taking to protect the Hunter from the damage that will be caused by your government’s great big new $3 billion tax on mining industries in the Hunter that will not flow through to other businesses?

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