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

It was a debate in which the Greens, as the member for Batman has noted, simply sold out—just as they did on the emissions trading scheme, just as they did when they lined up with the government to raise Australia's debt cap to an unlimited level, a debt cap that is now, clearly, going to be needed given that this government's return-to-surplus target has been pushed out to post 2020. It is a government that came to office saying it would deliver surplus in the first year and in every year after that. It is now saying it will not deliver a surplus this term, it will not deliver a surplus next term but maybe it will deliver a surplus of the term after that.

Let's face it, even that is in jeopardy, because we have the Treasurer out there saying that he is going to crack down on bracket creep—failing to tell the Australian people that bracket creep is the primary means by which his government intends to return the budget to surplus. Take away bracket creep and they have no hope of delivering a surplus budget, because they are unable to go tough on multinationals.

We on this side of the House have a $7 billion plan, which closes debt deduction loopholes and the use of hybrid instruments, which makes changes that are economically responsible, carefully costed by the Parliamentary Budget Office, informed by work done at the OECD. Yet while we are willing to back their multinational tax bill they are not willing to back our multinational tax measures. While we are willing to back their multinational tax bills, which simply have an asterisk where the costings should be, they are not willing to back our multinational tax package that adds $7 billion to the budget bottom line over the course of the next decade.

This amendment, now, is a test as to how serious the government is on the issue of multinational tax avoidance. Does the government believe that we should be with the rest of the G20 and OECD pack, with the other 40 countries that are moving at an appropriate time on the Common Reporting Standard, or should we be trailing up the back of the pack with the countries that are not really serious? This is a test for this government on multinational tax avoidance. Will it support Labor's amendment or will it turn to damp kale one more time?

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