Deloitte Report: Australia's Mining Sector More Than Paid its Dues
The resources sector has been paying its dues and contributes huge amount of money to the federal coffers, basing on the new data furnished on Monday by finance services firm Deloitte Access Economics.
While the Labour-led federal government has maintained that Australian mining firms have only transmitted a high of 27 percent tax as of last year, the new Deloitte report commissioned by the Minerals Council of Australia (MCA) rendered the government data grossly anaemic.
From the sector's operation in 2007 through 2010, local miners paid a tax rate that Deloitte said reached 41.5 percent and for fiscal year 2010-2011, the Federal Treasury is set to collect a whopping amount of more than $23 billion in taxes from the resources industry alone.
It turned out that measly figure provided by the government, then headed by former Prime Minister Kevin Rudd, was concocted by employing what MCA chief executive Mitch Hooke termed as 'unconventional method'.
Hooke added that Mr Rudd used the deflated numbers to support his agenda of pushing for the resources super profits tax (RSPT), which many observers said led to the Labour leader's eventual ouster, with current Prime Minister Julia Gillard replacing him.
Shortly after Ms Gillard was elected prime minister, she met with the CEOs of BHP Billiton, Rio Tinto and Xstrata and soon after, the RSPT was scraped in favour of the heavily re-configured minerals resource rent tax (MRRT) that the three giant miners have agreed to support.
The new Deloitte findings, the MCA said, only proved that the federal government tried to manipulate the public into believing that the resources industry was circumventing tax loopholes and not contributing its shares to the Australian economy.
"Had they properly considered the official data, they could have reached no other conclusion than the effective tax rate of combined royalties and company tax was in excess of 41 per cent," Hooke told The Australian Associated Press (AAP).
As a result, "the government charged the industry with not paying its way," the MCA chief added.
The Australian Parliament is set to introduce the MRRT this year and Ms Gillard has expressed optimism that barring any more glitches, its 30 percent tax collection provisions will be fully rolled out by the second half of 2012.