You are another one that does not support this tax as is. I can find no support for this tax.

The government announced this tax as a done deal with some room for negotiation on transitional arrangements and other minor aspects.

So we either agree with it as it is, or not. Hnery said it cannot be modified without irresponisble risk being passed on to the taxpayer and also to the economy as it is designed not to be a stimulus.

Too clouded with people saying they do not support it, but would a different tax and those that say they support it but with changes. Both essentially reject the tax.

The rich banks will get a tax cut to assist in paying the extra super 10 years away. We probably now have sovereign risk so that the banks get a small tax cut? How dandy. It is not even reliant on the tax being approved or not, will reflect the reality we have a government willing to introduce dangerous policy. Why would anyone invest in such a country? Put a few billion into a project and the next week the government changes the laws? This is the most stupid government I have ever witnessed and for what? Not even the poor get a look in. Only 30% business get a tax cut to support extra super contributions which is defacto wealth fund. Wallyworld economics.

Also Rudd stated last week he wished to assist those other industries like tourism and international students by trashing the aussie dollar. So again who pays for this? Petrol will be higher and interest rates will possible be at a premium for sovereign risk. The miners will not be paying for that. Hope both industries do well and get us through the next GFC because mining may not be able to now.

Flat Tax ! Problem solved, period !

If all the resources and minerals truly belonged to the Australian population, perhaps they should be nationalised, but I wonder what the risk/return would be then and where would we get the investment from ? The Tax Payer ? As soon as something pays-off there is always some one with his hand out saying "it's not fair"

Australia was built on free enterprise and we all get the benefit directly or indirectly in a strong economy.

Maybe you check your facts before you come out with this drivel.
The largest mining company in Australia, BHP paid 43% tax in 2009 and this was verified by their auditors.

http://www.businessspectator.com.au/bs.nsf/Article/resource-rent-tax-RSPT-super-profits-BHP-Billiton--pd20100524-5RALD?OpenDocument&src=sph

*As the global financial crisis passes the mining boom has returned and once again the benefits are unlikely to touch most Australians, but the Reserve Bank response will.*

Rubbish. BHP alone paid 6.3 billion$ in taxes. You think that those
$ don't benefit most of the community? Think again. Then the
taxes paid on top of that, like payroll tax, taxes on high incomes
paid by staff, contractors, suppliers, their suppliers.

Fact is, without the mining industry, we would be a banana republic.

If anyone should benefit from higher mining taxes, its the states,
for they own minerals, check your constitution.

Talk about shonky polticians quoting shonky figures in this debate!
If Julia tells any more porkies, her nose will be more like
Pinochio's :)

Mr Swan should be ashamed of himself.

The author writes >>The essential idea of the RSPT is simple: if a mining project is only earning ordinary returns then it would only attract the ordinary company tax. However, where a mine is sitting on a superior resource and generating super profits then the company should pay more tax. As the Henry Report put it:

Perhaps one alternative is for the government to 'underwrite' the miners costs associated with exploration.

Now I don't mean a 'tax deduction' but a full refund of all monies spent on exploration, even if the result of such exploration found that the project was deemed to be unviable, as is often the case.

Now if the government were to give such an assurance, then I doubt you would find any mining company that would reject such a system and, once the miners 'strike gold' so as to say, then the government gets a much larger slice of the pie.

At the end of the day, it is 'future exploration' that is most at risk under the current proposal.

So let the government share in the risk if they also wish to share in the potential gains.

Why we need a Resource Super Profits Tax:
So that we can discourage investment instead of encouraging it.
So that mining companies will move to other countries,
taking jobs and existing tax-paying capability with them.
So that existing related infrastructure can deteriorate and the taxpayer can step in to rebuild it.
So that we can live the socialist delusion that this time it will work.

Currently the Australian economy is growing at around 3% and unemployment sits at around 5%. The last time it was in the position was 2006 and the Federal Government reported a surplus of $17.3 billion.
This year under similar economic conditions the Federal Government is projecting a defict of $40 billion. This is a $57 billion turnaround. Why do we need a RSPT? To pay for all the wasted expediture undertaken by the Rudd Government.

Why do we need a RSPT? To pay for all the wasted expediture undertaken by the Rudd Government.

That pretty well sums it up I think!

Just imagine where we might be if these fools get another go at running the country.

God help us if there is one!

The latest essential report shows a clear majority supporting the tax by a 7% margin.
http://blogs.crikey.com.au/pollytics/2010/05/24/essential-report-trust-and-rspt/#more-7872

I think that this whole kerfuffle will just blow over after final negotiations. Caviar-munching mining magnate billionaires will pay some more tax and that will be it. Mining will continue as it always has. The hysterical argument that investment in Australian resources will collapse forever will be shown to have been masterbatory.

I guess that it is also just possible that it will eventually come to be broadly realised that while mining is important (and crucial for my resource sector hometown), referring to it as "the golden goose" is somewhat overstating things and often leads to the general impression that it is the be all and end all of employment creation - in fact, it accounts for just 1.5% of total employment. Even accounting for the downstream flow on, it would be lucky to make up much more than 5% of total employment.

So important yes - but I wouldn't be getting my knickers in a twist over the new tax. It's mostly just self-serving hype from the likes of Clive Palmer and co.

*The hysterical argument that investment in Australian resources will collapse forever will be shown to have been masterbatory.*

That argument was never made Fozz 2, apart from it seems, by
yourself.

The likes of Marius Kloppers of BHP are far more intelligent
and have far more integrity, then our bunch of 2 bob politicians,
its seems.

What they are simply pointing out is this: Mining developments
involve many billions of $ of capital investment upfront, all
provided by those prepared to take a risk on their savings
and investments, in hope of making a reasonable return for
that risk.

In the past, Govts of all persuasions have pleaded and
encouraged miners to make these investments, based on the
understanding that they were reliable and would keep their
word. Fact is that they can no longer be trusted and maybe
miners should demand written guarantees in future, about
changing the rules, once billions have been spent.

Miners will clearly keep mining developments where they have
already outlayed billions, to not do so would be foolish.

But given the new sovereign risk, the near doubling of
taxation on returns, miners will have to closely evaluate
any new investments in the future, for other options are
available elsewhere.

Let the Chinese mine in Australia, for of course on paper
they don't need to make any profits, so pay no tax at all,
but I'll let you learn all about their way of doing business
the hard way.

I didn't coin the term "kill the golden goose" Yabby, you need only check headlines of The Australian to find terms like that.

Scroll down just two articles in this forum and you see "How to disembowel an economy" as the terrifying headline for an article in which the author invokes shades of Hugo Chavez - truly scary if all that were fact rather than hype, especially if as one poster argued somewhere that "without mining we would be a banana republic".

If I went through current news reports and forums it would not take long to fill the post word limit with such gems. What is needed is calm discussion, not wild claims and counterclaims.

The miners will not go away if they end up having to pay more. Mining cannot simply be picked up and plonked down somewhere else if you don't like the tax regime in one place. The minerals are in the ground and they are not evenly distributed all over the world, they tend to be concentrated in hotspots and it is not rare for such places to truly fit that definition - bandits, civil wars, coups and unstable regimes. Remember Bouganville?

From an article in The Business Spectator:

"Qld govt to consider coal producers' rail network offer

The Queensland government has said it will consider the merits of a $4.85 billion bid submitted by a consortium of coal mining firms to buy the state's coal rail track network.

"The government has received a proposal from the coal miners' consortium and we would look at the specifics and merits of the proposal," a spokesman for the Queensland State Treasurer Andrew Fraser said."
http://www.businessspectator.com.au/bs.nsf/Article/Coal-producers-put-forward-cash-offer-for-Qld-rail-pd20100526-5SVMU?OpenDocument&rf=s
Umm guys, you're supposed to be avoiding Australia like the plague because of this "great big new tax" remember?

It's largely bluff and bluster by companies trying to get the best possible deal. There will be some more argy-bargy, the government will likely compromise on a couple of things, a deal wil be reached and that will be it. Mining will continue to lucrative.

Storm in a teacup.

*especially if as one poster argued somewhere that "without mining we would be a banana republic".*

Yup Fozz 2, that was me and in reality we would be. Take our
current account deficit, add another 100 bilion plus a year and
our lenders would treat us as such. Mining pays our bills.

*Umm guys, you're supposed to be avoiding Australia like the plague because of this "great big new tax" remember?*

Nope Fozz 2, that is not what they are saying. Railways are treated
as tax exempt btw. As I pointed out in my previous post, miners
will keep mining the mines that are already going. Its new
investments in new mines with new infrastructure, that is a
different thing and that is what people like Kloppers are saying.

The railway you quoted is servicing present mines, it makes sense
to own it

9 billion $ is not a storm in a teacup, its a great deal of money

The QLD rail network services most mining in QLD, present and future, unless the mine is a very short dump truck drive away from a suitable seaport. There is no other really feasable way to shift very large volumes of various kinds of dirt very long distances from outback mine to shiploader. Most future mines will also rely on rail.

Your argument then is that an offer of a colossal $5bn investment in an enormous piece of infrastructure that can never be packed up and taken away is a sensible financial decision for companies who have no intention of further expansion nor presumably increasing output from existing mines?

Your reference to the CAD as a stand alone figure has little meaning without context. Last I looked, there were countries with a relatively high CAD and a high standard of living (Australia, the US, the UK, New Zealand) and those with a low CAD but a low standard of living.

Fozz, the miners in the syndicate buying their own railway, would
have crunched the numbers. Divided between them, its not so much
per company. It really depends on what efficiency gains that they
can see can be made, to gain a return on their investment. The
mines are already there, they might as well own the rail too.
Any profits made on the railway, won't be affected by the mining
tax, as the company will be a separate entity.

The projects that won't go ahead is where new railways need to be
built, as in the iron ore industry, where they finance their own
rail, their own ports etc. Or projects like the expansion of
Olympic Dam in South Australia. Best to just rip the hell out
of present mines and with clever accountants, move as much money
as possible offshore. Most of these companies operate globally.

As to our current account deficit, in the end it has to be paid.
We pay it by borrowing ever more money, around 1 trillion $
right now, which our banks borrow, when they go cap in hand to
the money markets. If banks were not borrowing it, the RBA would
have to, for our nation's account have to be squared up regularly
and somehow we need to find the currency to pay it, or we do
become a banana republic. For just like a credit card, there
are limits that are eventually reached, which if we cross them,
our financiers will baulk at, as the Greeks have found out the
hard way.

At the moment financiers have good reason to keep lending to us,
to cover our current account, for we have a mining industry which
creates foreign currency, to repay it. Without the mining
industry, our currency would collapse, interest rates would
shoot through the roof and we could no longer afford to buy
medicines and all those other imports, which we depend on for
our cushy lifestyles.

I listened to Ken Henry in senate yesterday.

The rspt fund tax cuts for incorporated companies,about 30% business. Henry said research indicates tax cuts like this increase capital expenditure.

The other beneficiary will be the government spending program.

It is not to fund any superannaution contribution which is said will be financed by the salary and wages of employyes.

There are no numbers to support if this affects profits going offshore. Many analysts suggest it could benefit China who are often the only willing financiers of risky projects. It is fair to say there is no proof at all this will stop foreign owners making more from our resources, Henry said so.

The surprise one. Mining is in deep recession and the government stimulus saved the economy. So mining is not growing.

We cannot compare to Norway or need sovereign wealth funds because mining is such a small part of our economy. Norway is a one industry nation so Dutch disease arguments like the only Kevin Rudd actually tabled are wrong.

Overall tax rates are low but seems individual companies can pay very high tax. BHP for example pays 43% tax so those that will be hit by the tax could be already paying very high taxation. Averages do not seem useful for this industry.

So after Henry talk I ask what is the objective of this tax?

Does the tax and the government share the same outcomes? NO.

To share the wealth with all Australians?. NO.

To ensure our recources are paid for?. NO. Royalty is charged on whether the miner makes a profit or not so, this new tax removes that guarantee.

To fund increased superannuation contribtuons? NO

To subsidise corporate tax cuts for big business? YES.

TO help get government out of hole while blaming someone else.? YES

So essentially a plunder tax removing investment, potential jobs and cash flow from regional Australian and giving it to City business.

Simply a shift of capital from one part of the country to another.

So who is really greedy here?