Mathias Cormann (WA, Liberal Party, Minister for Finance) Share this | Hansard source

As I advised the Senate yesterday, the government has not made a decision to increase the rate of the GST. We are on the public record, and have been on the public record for some time, saying that we have been modelling some options at the request of state and territory governments including, and in particular, the good friend of Senator Conroy: the Labor Premier of South Australia, Jay Weatherill. There is no news in any of this, because this government is focused on how we can make our tax system more growth friendly, to help facilitate stronger growth and more jobs. We started that process on coming into government by getting rid of Labor's job-destroying carbon tax, by getting rid of Labor's job-destroying mining tax, and by encouraging small business to employ more Australians by providing a company tax cut for small business.