Andrew Leigh (Fraser, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Assistant Treasurer) Share this | Hansard source

I hope it will be possible to move this consideration in detail away from argument and towards accountability; away from preaching and towards parliamentary responsiveness. My questions are to the Assistant Treasurer and focus on some issues relating to the goods and services tax. On Boxing Day last year, Australians awoke to find the Assistant Treasurer splashed over the media, talking about his big plans to extend the GST to services like Netflix and to get rid of the low-value threshold exemption for overseas goods. As with many things the member for Kooyong does, it generated a little more heat than light—for example, the centrepiece of the member for Kooyong's first red-tape repeal day was to include scrapping the Australian Charities and Not-for-profits Commission, thankfully still up and running; and getting rid of the Future of Financial Advice reforms, thankfully blocked by the Senate.

Question (1): does the member for Kooyong still believe, as he wrote in TheAustralian:

It is not fair to taxpayers, or to retailers or their many employees, to exempt overseas online retailers from the GST, even if some consumers are enjoying the ride.

Question (2): is he still of the view that local Australian retailers are operating 'with one hand tied behind their backs' because of the exemption for goods worth under $1,000? Question (3): if it is the case that the Assistant Treasurer still stands by these comments, why has he made no move to do something about the low-value threshold in this year's budget?

Turning to the budget measure and applying the GST to digital products and services, the exposure draft of the amending legislation does not give cause for concern. Question (4): can the government explain why I can purchase a DVD box set of M*A*S*H through Amazon that would be exempt from the GST under the low value threshold, but if I purchase those same 240 glorious M*A*S*H episodes on a digital format through Netflix, I will, under the government's proposal, pay GST on those? The government says it is for lower, fairer, simpler taxes, but how does creating two kinds of tax treatment for essentially the same product meet that criteria? I turn now to the question of what imported services may look like. Question (5): will companies like Uber, Airbnb and Spinlister be covered by this measure?

Turning to the particular costings—unlike the government's multinational tax package, there are actual revenue estimates for this one—question (6): what assumptions were plugged into that costing to arrive at a revenue figure of $350 million over four years and what data or modelling is this based on about the volume of goods and services currently being imported GST-free? Question (7): how many companies providing digital products and services are estimated to become GST liable as a result of this change? Question (8): did Treasury or the government consult with significant international providers of digital products and services for introducing this measure, and, if so, which ones? Question (9): is the revenue estimate provided in the budget papers the same as the revenue estimate in the costings prepared by Treasury? Question (10): how will the government collect GST from the offshore companies that are captured by this measure? Question (11): what enforcement mechanisms will exist for offshore companies that fail to meet their GST obligations under the new measure? Question (12): what is the estimated GST compliance cost for the ATO in enforcing this measure? Question (13): why was 1 July 2017 chosen as the start date? And question (14): Minister, when will you finally see sense and back Labor's multinational tax package to properly crack down on multinational profit shifting, a package that would raise 60 times more revenue than the one you announced in the budget?

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