On 28th July, 2011 the Government released a discussion paper to inform public debate on priorities and directions for continuing tax reform in the lead-up to the Tax Forum on 4th – 5th October.
The Government claims to have put in place a series of major reforms to build a stronger, fairer and simpler tax system and the upcoming Tax Forum will help the ATO build on that strong record of tax forum.
The Tax Forum aims to help identify further reforms to make the most of the opportunities and challenges ahead for Australia, such as the shift in global economic weight from West to East, the ageing of the population and the transition to a clean-energy future.
The Tax Forum will help identify further reforms which build on the Government’s priorities of:
- Making the economy stronger by boosting participation and productivity and providing better incentives to work, save and invest;
- Making the tax system fairer by ensuring concessions are appropriately targeted and tax rules achieve their original policy intent; and
- Making the tax system simpler by removing unnecessary complexity.
The discussion paper outlines a range of ideas that were raised in the Australia’s Future Tax System Review that are likely to be discussed at the Tax Forum.
The discussion paper outlines a section on each of the six sessions that will be held at the forum, personal tax, transfer payments, business tax, state taxes, environmental and social taxes and tax system governance.
It also emphasises the Government’s commitment to fiscal discipline and the need for proposals that cut tax to also identify how they will be funded.
The Government has also released an initial invitation list for the forum which sets out participants and observers who have been selected, also explaining how others will be chosen.
The discussion paper, initial invitation list and online expression of interest form are available at the Tax Forum website at http://www.futuretax.gov.au.
The website also provides participants and other Australians with the chance to have their say on options for further reform, by uploading submissions and comments.
The Government has made reforming the tax and transfer system a priority since coming to office:
- In the 2008 Budget, the government delivered the first of three rounds of personal income tax cuts and commissioned the Australia’s Future Tax System Review (tax review).
- The 2009 Budget included the Secure and Sustainable Pension Reforms, which delivered an historic increase in the rate of the pension, strengthened indexation so the pension keeps up with the cost of living, introduced a new Work Bonus and announced a gradual increase in the age pension age.
- In May 2010 the budget included the Stronger, Fairer, Simpler package of reforms to get a fairer return on the non-renewable resources and support growth across the entire economy, including by cutting the company tax rate, providing tax breaks for all small businesses, boosting superannuation and making it fairer and investing in regional infrastructure.
- In the 12 months that followed, the Government announced a further 12 measures that deliver on reform directions identified by the tax review, including important reforms in this year’s Budget to boost workforce participation.
- Most recently, the Clean Energy Future package included major reforms which triple the tax-free threshold and take around one million extra Australians out of the tax system.
Has this been effective tax reform?
Well the Tax Forum is an important opportunity to get a broad cross-section of views on priorities and directions for further reforming the tax and transfer system.
