You can only dig it up once so the Australian people should benifit from it as much as possible, and it's not as if this can be offshored like the rest of our industry.

I think this is a brilliant masterstroke and I dont know why they are not playing it up more.
First there is the increased government revenue. Always a good thing in a time of deficit.
Then there is the fact that it will dampen down the mining boom and reduce the inflationary effects of skills shortages and low unemployment. Which will keep interest rates down.
Finally we get to keep more of our resources in the ground to sell when the rest of the world runs low and we can get top dollar.
Aside from a few rich suits I dont see how anyone could complain.

Giving the money to Superannuation companies is as safe as giving money to contractors to put pink bats in your roof or builders to put tin sheds up for a million dollars. This Government knows it has spent its way into so much debt so quickly that it is in the poo. Now it wants to take from those who work hard and take the risks and who already funds tens of thousands of public servants doing their 7 hours a day in Canberra to receive fat salaries. No wonder even the likes of mild mannered Twiggy can't contain themselves with such a blatant cash grab to pay for their out of control election grabbing spending. Thankfully the public have woken up.

Mikk, the little problem that you face is the law of unintended
consequences, when you overlook a few variables in the equation.

Australia has one teeny weeny problem and that is a regular
monthly current account deficit and total net debts of around
1 trillion $. We won't pay it back with seashells. So we
continue to borrow each month, to keep the wheels falling off
the cart.

Our four main banks are amongst the world's largest borrowers.

Mining is about the only way that we will dig our way out of our
financial hole. Building more houses for more migrants, is not going
to do it.

If mining slacks off and our current account grows, overseas investors
who provide all these funds, will get nervous, as they did with
Greece or Iceland, when the numbers did not stack up anymore.

Very quickly that cheap money becomes very expensive money, as more
risk will mean higher interest rates and there is not a thing
that the Govt or Reserve Bank will be able to do about it.

If we then need the IMF to bail us out, all your protesting in
the streets will not change things. They don't fart around either,
when they lay down their conditions.

But ignore all this at your peril.

For those who support the tax, have you really though this through.

Picture yourself as an employee of a strawberry farmer.

You work your 38hr week for say $700.

Now, if the farmer came to you and offered you an additional 15 hours per week, at overtime rates and, you wanted the work, would you accept it?

Now after you have accepted it, the farmer than says to you, by the way, you will be taxed at 70cents in the dollar and I can only pay you if I can sell the strawberries, otherwise you will have worked for nothing.

Now, be honnest, would you accept those conditions if you were that worker?

Now of cause the answer is no! But this is exactly what the government is asking the miners to do.

What they may well do is simply stop investing in exploration and cease to expand.

The alternative option here would be to tax the resourse. I have no problem with that, but don't jeopodise the financial future of our nation by making the business of mining hardley worth the effort.

After all, the CEO's of the mining companies can get 5 or 6% return on investment simply by sitting on thier hands.

Why on earth would they risk billions, knowing full well they will be robbed at the end.

Mining rents and ‘super profits ? but nothing about the Public Service & super awards ?

To me this article is another piece of the picture.
Unlike some, I don't like jumping to conclusions on purely mass media releases.

I wonder has The Govt hasn't got in the back of it's mind to address the differences between the mining and petroleum taxes. Having made their 'sure hands, Australia first' re-election pitch they may be inclined to 'having heard the people' fiddle with the thresholds and definition.

Regardless of which party is involved, it is the 'people' who vote and therefore need to be convinced...that's party politics. Both parties need to do this multi issue balancing act between competing interests. It is one thing to declare the supremacy of the people's interests but to achieve it is a whole other topic. Finally all parties have to play popular perceptions game....*seen* to be done.

I think it's too simplistic by orders of magnitude to assert that the reason for this tax and it's pejorative labeling is all about filling "holes?" (pejorative term).

I'll wait untill the final form, in absence of ALL the information (it won't be as currently presented.) before I make a decision.
Sadly our entire system is built around expensive rituals and OTT angst, fear and loathing before it happens.

I see no real problem with the tax. For the companies to say they will stop mining and the industry will collapse is posturing. These resources are finite and they need to serve the nation and the world for that matter for as long as possible, not just fill the pockets of the baby boomers and their massive appetite for consumption and selfish greed. Never mind the rights and wrongs of the budget, all i have heard as feed back is "what about me" not "was this good for the nation".
The slowing of the boom side of our two paced economy will cause some hurt to the national debt and trade for a period but ultimately will lead to a more stable economic position where the strengths and weaknesses are more evenly spread.
The problem of course stands in what will be done with the money. I would rather see the future fund expand it's portfolio for the future, rather than let the heads of the super funds set us up for another financial disaster.

*For the companies to say they will stop mining and the industry will collapse is posturing.*

Ah Nairbe, but that is not what the companies are saying. Obviously
mines already developed and running, will continue.

What the companies are saying is that they expect Govts to be
reliable and not act like those in parts of the third world.

What companies are saying, is that when they they work on the feasability study of a project, before they spend billions or
tens of billions of $ on development, they need to be able
to budget on net returns, so that projects are bankable and
a decision can be made, if it pays to go forward or not.

If not, no worries, they can look at other projects elsewhere.
Or not borrow any money in the first place.

Companies have in fact been paying around 43% of profits in
tax. Of the rest, only a small amount ever went to shareholders,
most was ploughed into expansions and upgrades, usually in
Australia.

What companies are saying is that if they had known that little
jokes like this one were coming, they would have never gone ahead
with alot of the present projects on the go.

What companies are saying that all new projects will have to be
evaluated using the new figures, which involves hundreds of
projects and its highly likely that the majority will be canned
or delayed until the figures improve.

Given that the Govt is proving to be as reliable and predictable
as a blonde bimbo on heat, I don't blame them.