Ed Husic (Chifley, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary to the Shadow Treasurer) Share this | Hansard source

When you think about the level of seriousness that has been attached to the Tax and Superannuation Laws Amendment (2016 Measures No. 1) Bill 2016, it is really a sad joke. This is a bill that has sought, in many respects, to be a fig leaf. In the whole debate about multinational tax reform, people were asking the coalition: 'What are you going to do about the way in which multinationals game different tax systems all over the globe? What's your response?' The coalition's response is, effectively, to target the 15-year-old who downloads a video or some other person who is getting some other digital product and to apply the GST to it—as if targeting a music download or a video download and applying the GST to it is the big answer and will fix multinational tax issues that are confronting the nation. It is simply a joke that that is the big answer in all of this. Yes, it will raise some money, no doubt. Yes, it is important that we find different ways to improve revenue. But, if reliance on this is evidence of a government's commitment to tackle the big, pressing problem of the complete erosion of revenue as a result of multinationals gaming taxation systems in the world, it is just a joke. It is symptomatic of a government that is not really committed to this issue.

Labor has put forward a series of policies designed to address this. In fact, we believe that our policies would raise more than $7 billion through the measures that we put forward, not the least of which would increase resources to the ATO to enable better compliance. Targeting the 15-year-old who finds something cheaper on the internet and downloads it and hitting them with a GST—and this is apparently massive GST reform—is, as I said before, laughable.

What is also laughable is the speed at which the government took up this option. There have been concerns for quite some time about the way in which many of these large companies have gamed taxation systems, engaged in profit shifting and used transfer pricing to help themselves. Not only that but those acts—the use of transfer pricing and, in effect, profit shifting—have themselves impacted on Australian general consumers and small businesses. For years, we have been raising the issue of the way in which these companies set their pricing and overcharged Australian consumers and small businesses in the process. In fact, a report went to the then Minister for Communications, now the Prime Minister, indicating that Australians were being ripped off and that we were paying, in some cases, 50 per cent or, in some cases, 200 per cent more. These prices reflect the way in which major companies charge their subsidiaries for product knowing that, if they charge in a particular way and the local entity does not make a profit, they will not be required to pay tax at a particular level. They will be able to sidestep the obligations expected of them by the way that they structure themselves.

The government have moved super-fast to charge some 15-year-old for downloading music and not having a GST applied to it—they have said, 'Well, we fixed that'—but what about the pricing overall? They have not dealt at all with those pricing issues that inject a level of inflation into the broader system. Their only answer has been: 'We're going to get those big multinationals. We're going to charge them GST.' That is not even half the job done properly.

It is all cosmetics. As is often the case with the government, it is all about the style; it is never about the substance. I think of the government and the way in which the Prime Minister has used his massive popularity. He has used the popularity of the government to, effectively, transform the government into a petting zoo. That is the equivalent of what they have done. This is a much cuter version of a government compared to the last lot. The last lot were the equivalent of a snake farm, and no-one really wanted to hang around them. Now they have brought in the petting zoo, with all these new, cute faces that they think will be there to answer for them. But, in most instances, when you turn to a petting zoo for a decision, they just blink back—they have no answer—and that is what we have got from the government. Every time there is a hard decision to be made, they do not want to sacrifice their popularity. They do not want to sacrifice feeling good about the way they are.

Mr Hunt interjecting—

I will take the interjection from the bestest minister in the world and thank him for it. Congratulations—

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