Show us the money: $11b mining tax hits another hurdle

Show us the money: $11b mining tax hits another hurdle

Seeking transparency

... Greens leader Bob Brown has demanded the government reveal its mining tax revenue costings. The government says it cannot reveal the information because it is commercially sensitive. Photo: David Tease

THE Gillard government's mining tax could be stalled in Parliament, with the Greens, the Coalition and the independent MP Rob Oakeshott demanding to know how the government calculated the revenue the tax will raise before they will consider it.

The Greens leader, Bob Brown, wrote to the Treasurer, Wayne Swan, this week demanding the information be made public before the tax is debated later in the year.

A recent Senate committee, chaired by the Liberal senator Mathias Cormann, also recommended that ''the Parliament require the public release of all mining-tax-related revenue assumptions, including commodity price and production volume assumptions''. It also called for Parliament to ''insist on release of that information before it agrees to consider any mining-tax-related legislation''.

But the government has repeatedly refused to provide information about how it calculated the revenue to be raised by the watered-down mining tax because its details were hammered out in secret negotiations with three big miners - Xstrata, BHP Billiton and Rio Tinto - and information provided by the miners is commercially sensitive.

As international economic uncertainty casts doubt over the budget's return to surplus and exacerbates the downturn in non-mining sectors of the Australian economy, revenue from the tax and the company tax cut it is slated to pay for become more important to the government's economic strategy.

The tough economic conditions have also led to calls from some business leaders to slow the introduction of the $11 billion carbon tax, which will be debated next month and is due to start next July, but Mr Swan yesterday ruled out any delay.

Senator Brown said the lack of information on the mining tax was ''increasingly unsatisfactory''.

''The time is coming where the Senate is going to have to flex its muscle. If the information is really commercial in-confidence, the Senate committee could meet in-camera, but what the Treasury is in fact saying is that bureaucrats are allowed to have crucial information but parliamentarians, who are being asked to vote on the relevant laws, are not. It is illogical and unacceptable.''

The Greens have previously said they will pass the tax, which is also scheduled to start next July, although they preferred the original, much larger resource super profits tax. But Senator Brown said he was determined to first get the crucial information.

Mr Oakeshott also said ''keeping figures from the Parliament will work against the government when we consider this legislation''.

When the watered-down mining tax was announced last July, it was estimated to raise $10.5 billion over the first two years. The mid-year economic forecasts revised that down to $7.4 billion. In the May budget, it was revised up to $7.7 billion for the first two years and $11.1 billion for the first three.

The budget says the tax is ''a highly variable source of revenue as they are heavily influenced by commodity prices and exchange rate levels''.

Mr Swan said despite the international volatility, investment in Australian mining was ''unprecedented''.

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