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

If WA Treasurer Nahan said what was quoted then that is wrong. As we have said on the public record for a long time—and indeed I answered a question to this effect in Senate estimates—the Australian Taxation Office is an independent statutory agency which enforces our tax laws independently, as it must. It is not a matter for the ministerial level of government to interfere with.

But what I would say again is it is interesting we went from New South Wales to the Northern Territory, I see. No WA Labor senator is courageous enough to touch these questions, because they know the terrible history that the WA Labor Party has when it comes to deep-seated corruption between the then WA Labor state government and some business leaders in the WA community at the time. Western Australian taxpayers are still paying hundreds of millions of dollars in legal fees—so far—to sort out a mess that the Burke and Dowding Labor governments created. (Time expired)