Veteran Liberal Senator Ian Macdonald said he is against any rise to the Goods and Services Tax but supports the widening of its application. He added that being sworn in under the Howard government, he vouched the tax would not rise beyond 10 percent after it was introduced in July 2000.

“I was around when this GST proposal was originally introduced and at the time I and everyone around from the prime minister down promised that it would never go beyond 10 per cent,” he told ABC News Radio. “We all swore in blood that it would not; that it would remain at 10 percent and that’s a commitment that I as one of them who gave it intend to honour.”

“I'm opposed to any increase beyond 10 per cent of the GST rate and that's something, as I say, that I committed to, John Howard committed to, anyone there at the time,” he added.

Though Macdonald vehemently opposed a rise in GST, he said that all goods and services be brought under its domain. According to him, sectors like health and education that have been kept outside the realm of GST for so long would have yielded an additional revenue of US$17 billion in the last financial year. Since Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull’s indication that the government would be considering all kinds of tax reforms, there have been speculations that certain goods and services that are currently exempted from the GST would be included in it.

Macdonald said he would want the government to continue with the policies that were promised to the people under the Howard government. Although he was not sure whether the original proposal for the GST covered health and education, he still thinks the people should not be deprived of what they were promised when they elected the then-government.

Former Prime Minister John Howard led the Australian government for two consecutive terms from 1996 to 2007. GST was introduced under his tenure in July 2000 on most goods and services except a few that included health, education and fresh food. Macdonald was sworn in as a member of the Australian Senate in July 1990. When the Howard government came to power in 1996, he was given the position of Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of environment.

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