Lisa Singh (Tasmania, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

To respond to Senator Fifield, Minister Wong did answer Senator Cormann's question. Senator Fifield and those opposite clearly just did not like the answer that was provided by Minister Wong because it did not fit with their headline-making strategy and with the press release they had ready to go out. The answer that Minister Wong provided outlined the fact that the first MRRT instalment was only actually due a few days ago.

She also outlined that Treasury will therefore provide the final numbers to the government once they have complied with their legal obligations and completed their analysis. She informed the senator that, consistent with the ATO privacy provisions, ministers will not receive any information about individual companies and that the government will then release information on resource tax collections each month in the normal way, commencing from the October monthly financial report that is due out in December and subject to the same taxpayer confidentiality rules that have long applied, including when those opposite were in government.

So those opposite need to understand and realise that the minister has answered the question but it is simply not the way that they intended to hear the answer, because it did not fit with their headline-making strategy. They also need to take a breath and remember how it worked once upon a time when those senators were in government to understand the process that is involved through Treasury and through the government releasing those resource tax collection figures each month. They take a couple of months and will be provided in December.

But senators opposite did not want to hear that from the minister at all today because senators opposite do not like the Minerals Resource Rent Tax. They do not like it because they know that it delivers good things for Australian families. It delivers a shared increase of those profits that come from the resources that can only be dug up once, which Australians understand. Those opposite simply do not like the nature of that tax. We have said for some time that this is very much vital economic reform for this country. It very much does build on the tax review and a long process of consultation across this country.

Australians know how important the mining industry is but they also know that we can only dig up our resources that are in the ground once. Therefore, a profits based tax which is much more efficient than state royalties is a way we can tackle this issue. By putting in place a profits based tax, we can get a better return on our resources when prices are high and their values increase. That is why we have put this tax in place. When prices and profits go up, so do revenues. When prices and profits go down, so too do revenues. That is the whole point of it. It is fairly simple to understand.