Matt Thistlethwaite (Kingsford Smith, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Assistant Minister for Treasury) Share this | Hansard source

I had to laugh when I read this motion moved by the member for Berowra, because it's factually incorrect. This government hasn't been legislating tougher measures against multinational tax avoidance. The government have said that the opposition is opposed to their multinational anti-avoidance legislation in parliament when we actually voted for it. So the motion contains factual inaccuracies, and if this is the sort of stuff that they're going to come in here and move then it is no wonder the economy is in the mess that it's in.

The member for Berowra said that they'd inherited all this debt from the Labor Party—well, they've doubled that! They've doubled the amount of debt that we have in this country, sending it almost through the half-a-trillion dollar mark. When it comes to closing multinational tax-avoidance loopholes, we all know what this government's record is like because they voted to keep them open in 2013. When Labor was proposing a wave of tax loophole changes into our tax system, changes introduced by former Assistant Treasurer David Bradbury, the coalition voted against them. They voted to keep those tax loopholes open. And who could forget, in 2015, when the current Prime Minister tried to claim credit for a $300 million tax judgement against Chevron that relied on laws that he and his colleagues voted against. We had the former Treasurer claiming, 'We've won this great case against Chevron,' despite the fact that he actually voted against the laws that enabled the government to win that tax judgement against Chevron.

When it comes to tax transparency, the coalition voted against transparency laws when they were in opposition and then when they got to government in 2015 they actually watered them down. It was the great occasion when this government teamed up with the Greens in the Senate—that's right, they got into bed with the Greens in the Senate—and reduced the number of companies in Australia that are subject to tax transparency laws or, in other words, having to disclose on an annual basis the amount of tax that they actually pay to the government through their private entities. Two-thirds of those firms that were previously included in that legislation when Labor established it were then exempted by this government's actions in 2015.

We've seen the Liberals again and again oppose Labor's sensible measures to close tax loopholes. It's only Labor that has really been serious in the last decade about closing down those tax havens. Only Labor will make firms doing business in tax havens disclose to shareholders and significant tenderers their country of domicile. Labor will also require country-by-country reporting and will work with superannuation firms to make sure that they develop guidelines for tax haven investments.

We've seen that phoenixing has become a massive issue, where dodgy directors deliberately burn companies in an attempt to avoid their obligations to employees, taxpayers and honest businesses. It affects many in our community, ruining innocent people's lives and livelihoods. Illegal phoenixing activity costs billions of dollars to our economy annually. Yet just last month, more than a year after promising action, the government was finally dragged kicking and screaming to provide a time line for legislating to tackle dodgy phoenixing activity. Director identification numbers have been cited as the single most effective measure to crack down on illegal phoenixing activity. This is something that Labor has been advocating for years, and it is only just recently that the government has agreed to look at this. After ruling out the use of biometrics, after multiple court reports of dodgy directors burning innocent people and after billions of dollars being drained from the tax system, the coalition has finally decided to do something. It shouldn't have taken so long, especially considering that the government was briefed on this issue about three years ago.

This government have really given up on governing when it comes to tackling multinational tax avoidance. They've voted with the Greens in the Senate to reduce transparency. They voted against Labor's sensible tax transparency measures. They voted against closing multinational loopholes. And they've delayed the introduction of director identification numbers, which would ensure that we can crack down on phoenixing activity. When it comes to talking about tax transparency, only one party in this parliament has the runs on the board—and that is the Labor Party.

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