The Point Live: Business and gas companies have their say on gas tax proposals. As it happened.

Well then. That was something wasn’t it.

Hearing there will be at least 160,000 people cut from the NDIS over the next four years (and others who will never be able to receive funding at all) because of the growth cuts – which will be set at 2% (this as fossil fuel subsidies growth funding increases – but it is ‘not the time’ to change any of that) because of budget concerns, while a bunch of gas executives and their senate proxies on the committee (you can guess who) claim it would be end times for their industry if they are made to pay a little more tax. And then at the end, we hear that the profits tax – the PRRT – reaped just $1.5bn in the same year the entities reported $46bn in revenue.

What more can you say really. And it looks like at this point, that the Labor government will fall for the same old tricks it has been hamstrung by for decades and fold. Just wait for the LACO – Labor Always Chickens Out.

I cover some of this (along with different chats) in my column in the New Daily tomorrow, so check that out. And make sure you come back to the Point for more factchecks and explainers.

The world is depressing. Things like this – although small in the scheme of shittery really do take their toll. So please – take care of you and those around you. See you soon. Ax

Oh one more question – what was the total revenue for the oil and gas industry when it paid $1.5bn in PRRT?

So assessable receipts for PRRT in the 2023/24 year in total worth $46,180,000,000

That is $48 billion and some change. In revenue.

And you got $1.5bn in PRRT.

Last question from Steph Hodgins-May – would an export tax fall on customers (like the importing countries) or the gas industry.

Treasury falls back on pointing to what has been said instead of saying yes. (Because they can’t say yes)

I guess you’re asking me to comment on a hypothetical. So I won’t offer an opinion per se, but what I would point to is that, as as we’ve heard through various witnesses that have spoken, I think a lot of the exports are actually underpinned by either long term contracts where prices are relatively well established, or spot sales to to markets where, essentially it’s a global price which is being set. And both of those factors would seem to suggest that the the economic burden of any tax change would be more likely to fall on on the producers,

Has Treasury done any modelling on gas taxation?

Treasury says it can’t say this close to the budget whether it has or has not done modelling on gas taxation.

So you can’t know if off shore gas is paying any PRRT, and you can’t know whether Treasury has been asked to do any modelling and you are not allowed to know project by project whether they are paying tax.

Jack Thrower

There’s been a lot of talk today, including from Treasury, about tax changes discouraging investment in gas. It’s important to remember the following:

First: Existing projects will be fine. World gas prices are significantly higher today than they were back when many of Australia’s biggest gas projects were commenced, so the idea that our gas industry would not be viable if they had to pay a 25% gas export tax is demonstrably untrue.

Second: Many future projects will also be fine (unfortunately). The gas industry is one of the most profitable industries in the world, precisely because the prices it receives are so much higher than their costs of production.

Third: Even if it were to deter investment, this would actually be a good thing – particularly for the climate. Currently, Australia has 45 oil and gas projects in development, contrary to calls for an end to new fossil fuel developments from the International Energy Agency (IEA), the United Nations, scientists and others. For Australia and the world to escape the worst of climate change, that means no new fossil fuel projects.

Total PRRT paid in the last year – $1.5bn says the ATO.

So David Pocock asks why the ATO can’t tell him how much comes from gas. He says a few years ago he was told none of the PRRT came from gas, but now that they are allegedly paying, he can’t find out how much the gas industry is paying in PRRT.

So LNG only – how much PRRT?

Well Treasury says there were five off-shore LNG facilities paying PRRT in 2023-24. We don’t have the newest data yet.

So if Treasury and the ATO don’t have visibility over whether or not the gas entities are paying then who is looking at this, David Pocock asks.

Treasury kicks it to ATO.

ATO says it can’t release information on a project to project basis. So it publishes on an entity basis.

And returns are lodged by entity on each project. So they have the information, but are not able to publish it.

So aggregated, how much does gas contribute to the total of $1.5bn. The ATO doesn’t know. They will have to check if it is allowable to release even the aggregated information.

Susan McDonald makes a point of asking the ACCC about domestic gas prices. They are slightly lower than usual at the moment. The idea McDonald is getting to here is that the gas industry is being responsible.

But as the ABC’s chief business corro Ian Verrender pointed out earlier this week, all is not what it seems:

What’s different this time?

While the three east coast gas giants have almost total market control, they’ve been spooked by a change of community attitude, the prospect of much higher taxes and yet-to-be-formulated new laws that require them to prioritise domestic customers.

That has them walking on eggshells.

Susan McDonald is “sure” the ATO is “dying” to correct the record about the 2019 statement that the AFR headline (which you might have seen in some Australia Institute materials) that the gas and oil industry were “systemic non payers”.

The ATO’s Michelle Sams says:

I’ll start just by reading the full quote referred to from 2019 before commenting, I understand the quote referred to as ATO said a small number of firms were systemic non payers. They do cover all sectors of the economy and industry sectors. There are some notable sectors in that population, though, and one of those sectors that we do expect to see transitioning from their loss phase is the oil and gas sector. Many of the oil and gas companies have generated losses through the construction phase of their large offshore projects. As they start to come online, these taxpayers will transition to utilizing losses and becoming tax payable.

The ATO expect several large oil and gas companies to start paying tax in the early 2020s in terms of what was meant at that time, the ATO was made a number of detailed submissions to Senate Committees over a number of years, in respect of oil and gas, over the course of the tax avoidance Task Force, and I would refer the committee to our November 2019, submission, around the same time of that relevant statement, because I think it provides some relevant context.

At the time, we were explicit that the oil and gas project life cycle is such that it is expected that participants incur significant tax losses at the startup phase prior to a period of utilization of those losses in later years before they ultimately become tax payable, which I think is clear from the quote I’d go on and say, at the time of relevant quote, subject to market conditions, as well as, you know, firm tax administration on some critical issues.

The 2019 submission also refers to key risks, including transfer pricing, risk related to related party financing and supply chains. But the expectation was that a number of oil and gas companies would utilize carry forward tax losses and start to come tax payable over the short to immediate.

And if you look at the aggregate aggregated data provided on more recent submissions and that includes our 2021 submission in 2026. And that is, in fact, what has occurred over time.

So more oil and gas companies have become tax payable over time, and the latest corporate tax transparency data shows corporate tax paid by oil and gas for the 23/24 year, which is the most recent numbers reported, was $10.4 billion.

So hopefully that provides some relevant context, but I’m happy to take further questions.

So at the time, there were non-compliant, but there have been more come on line to pay tax.

McDonald is now moving on to corporate tax (which every corporation pays). Does the ATO expect to see any return from the high prices of gas now paid back to the Australian tax payer?

A lot of the pricing of these contracts is based on long term contracts. So I think the extent that current events has an impact on prices, and they’re priced in to contracts over a longer term, potentially, yes, we’ll see those profits returned in Australia and subject to tax.

What is the total value of PRRT credits held by industry?

Susie Emery from the ATO wants to know what is meant by credits. Steph Hodgins-May says the uplift credits.

The answer – 2023/24 – $282 billion and 629 million. (Page 18 of the ATO submission)

Does that mean they would have to earn more than $282 billion before they pay the full rate of PRRT? Well, it depends on the project, but for the entire industry, yes – they would have to earn $282 billion and a bit before they had to pay the full PRRT. (although it is being paid on 10% of revenues earned under the most recent changes)

Is there any economic or theoretical reason why no royalties for gas are charged in Commonwealth waters?

Marty Robinson, First Assistant Secretary for Treasury says:

So Senator, there are some legacy projects which are paying Commonwealth royalties, I think, in most specific relation to North West shelf and, I think also Barrow Island. They are both projects that were pre dating the PRRT , and which have been subject to royalties and are in Commonwealth waters

He also questions Steph Hodgins-May’s choice to call gas a free input, saying:

I just question the notion that the companies are getting their inputs for free. I think the way, the way we think about the operation of tax. Basically all companies operating in Australia are subject to corporate income tax, and that’s sort of as a base. And then you think of additional layers of tax, which are essentially, they’re designed to provide a return to the Australian community, effectively, for the value of the resource. Now, there are different ways that taxes, so there are different ways that that can be be done. There are royalties, which, as I just noted, some historical royalties, that’s right. And then there are there are profits based taxes, like the PRRT and that implicitly values, the resource in calculating the profit to which the tax applies.

No opening statements from Treasury, the ATO or the ACCC.

So we are now into questions. Public servants do not have to give opinions.

OK, we are in the home stretch of today’s gas tax inquiry.

We are only trying to bring you the main parts and not repeat ourselves too much, as well as fact check what else is out there, if you are wondering why the speed of posts isn’t as much as a parliament day.

Next up we have:

Treasury
Mr Marty Robinson, First Assistant Secretary
Ms Susan Bultitude, Assistant Secretary
Australian Taxation Office (Submission 65)
Ms Michelle Sams, Deputy Commissioner, Public Groups Engagement
Ms Suzie Emery, Assistant Commissioner, Public Groups Engagement
Mr Rhys Manley, Assistant Commissioner, Policy, Analysis and Legislation
Australian Competition and Consumer Commission
Ms Anna Brakey, Commissioner
Ms Angela Woo, General Manager, Gas Markets Branch
Mr Wallace Stark, Director, Gas Markets Branc

While we hear the same arguments from the gas industry as to why they can’t pay tax, here is some of the other excuses given by large corporations in why they charge as they do. As AAP reports:

Guardrails to avoid “gaming” of supermarket item prices were altered in response to surging inflation, a Woolworths executive has told the Federal Court.

The competition watchdog claims Woolies and Coles temporarily hiked prices before reducing them to disguise increases through their “Prices Down” and “Down Down” marketing campaigns.

Minimum time limits to avoid gaming of prices had been established during a low-inflation period but had to be reduced as the COVID pandemic drove widespread inflation, Woolworths chief commercial officer Paul Harker said.

“The guidance that we have is not very particular, other than saying you needed to hold a price for a reasonable period of time and sell reasonable quantities,” he told the hearing in Sydney.

“Our determination of what is reasonable is in the price trust policy that was rolled out to the team, (and) as inflation continued to grow and grow and grow, we revised these policies.”

Gaming refers to using market mechanisms, pricing or supply levels to artificially inflate prices or gain an unfair advantage over competitors.

Mr Harker said the supermarket giant had initially set established price periods and resting periods – which prevented products from returning to the campaign for at least six months after being removed – to avoid gaming of prices by suppliers.

“It was to make sure the category manager and the supplier, in putting the product onto the program, were committed to what it was actually trying to achieve and it would be there for as reasonably as long as possible,” he said.

“These rules were in a low inflation environment, and were designed to make a long term commitment to the program by making it difficult to take the product off the program.” 

An initial minimum establishment price period of eight to 12 weeks became “onerous” on Woolworths’ teams and was later changed to a period of three to six weeks, the executive said.

Coles offered its defence in the joint case brought by the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission in February in a 10-session hearing, but the court’s final judgment will be withheld until each supermarket giant’s case is heard.

Mr Harker, who has been with Woolworths since 1993, noted Coles was using a similar price promotion when Woolworths launched “Prices Down”.

“Certainly, our competitor was doing something similar,” he said.

“We had already attempted a few years before that with a shelf prices reduced campaign across the store; it didn’t resonate.”

On Monday, ACCC lawyers  accused Woolworths of employing “subtle magic” in its pricing campaign to disguise price hikes with outsized, short-term increases before reducing them to above the original shelf price.

The commission argues the supermarkets offered certain products at a regular price for at least 180 days, hiked their price by at least 15 per cent for a “relatively short period of time”, before reducing them to above the original shelf price alongside “Prices Dropped” or “Down Down” tags.

The case would hinge on the duration of the temporary price hike and what is considered a “reasonable” period.

“If the price establishment period was three months, we wouldn’t be here,” Justice Michael O’Bryan told the court on Monday.

“If it was always one week, the case might not be fought.

“We’re somewhere in the middle and that’s what makes this case rather difficult.”

The ACCC alleges the conduct involved 266 products at Woolies and 245 goods at Coles at different times between late 2021 and mid-2023, impacting tens of millions of sales and deriving significant revenue for the grocery giants.

The basket was whittled down to 12 agreed items to be scrutinised in court, including a Tim Tams Family pack, Carman’s classic fruit and nut muesli bars and Sakata rice crackers.

Cecile Wake of Shell Oil suggested earlier that they were putting $1m into the advertising campaign by the Australian Energy Producers (AEP) because, “unlike The Australia Institute”, their adverts are subject to Advertising Standards.

Ok then, let’s have a look at one of those adverts and see how its standards are.

One of its Facebook adverts says that the suggestion Australia gets a pittance for its gas compared to Norway and Qatar is a LIE.

Gee a “Lie”… hmm let’s put that through the fact checker…

Claim: Australia gets a pittance for its gas compared to Norway and Qatar.

Verdict: The claim is true. AEP’s lie detector must be faulty.

Let’s compare Norway and Australia.

Australia’s gas industry revenue has exploded while its contribution to government revenue has remained stubbornly flat, only ticking up slightly in recent years as the scale of the industry’s massive profits meant that the industry couldn’t entirely dodge taxes. Meanwhile, when Norway’s petroleum industry booms, so do Norwegian government revenues.

Qatar similarly has also not allowed multinational gas companies to take the piss. While Qatar and Australia export a similar value of LNG, Qatar raises around five times more government revenue from these exports.

The gas lobby likes to point out differences between Australia’s system and those in Norway and Qatar; this is a distraction technique and ignores that Australian governments already assist gas companies in various ways. More importantly, the idea that the gas industry wouldn’t mind shifting to a tax system like Norway’s is laughable, as mentioned by Skye Predavec earlier today, the gas industry was not at all happy with the creation of Norway’s system and lobbied hard against its creation.

In the words of Jens Stoltenberg, Norway’s finance minister:

we invite foreign companies to invest, to produce, and then, of course, they can sell the oil and gas. But partly, we taxed them quite heavily. It’s 78% tax rate. And they told us that was impossible, but they come and invest. [LAUGHTER] And we taxed them, and they stay, because they earn money even with a tax rate of 78%

So, sorry Shell Oil and the rest of the gas industry, we’re quite happy with the standards of our advertising, maybe you might like to reflect upon your own….

ConocoPhillips are now making a big deal about the limitations of the ATO Tax Transparency Document.

They think it has limitations because of this

They really want us to know that they do pay tax in other places. Such as through their investment in APLNG.

In effect they want us to ignore the figures provided by the ATO because they really hate that it shows they paid no tax.

So now we have ConocoPhillips and Origin

ConocoPhillips’s submission was all about how much they really do pay tax.

They don’t mention PRRT though

What do they mention?

“ConocoPhillips Australia pays significant tax in Australia predominantly through its 47.5 percent ownership interest in APLNG, which is taxed in its own right, and pays Federal company income tax and Queensland State-based royalties. In addition, ConocoPhillips Australia directly pays payroll tax, Fringe Benefits Tax (FBT) and Goods and Services Tax (GST).”

A reminder ROYALTIES ARE NOT TAXES.

But also they really are bragging about paying payroll and fringe benefits tax???

Also about the GST. The ATO’s own submission to the committee noted this

“Under the GST regime, exports are GST free. This means that exporters will typically receive refunds for input tax credits on acquisitions without remitting GST on exported sales. The position for an exporter in the oil and gas industry is consistent with that of an ordinary exporter.

Significant expenditure is incurred during the construction phase of each project and therefore the GST paid on that expenditure may result in material input tax credits being claimed and subsequently refunded. “

So ConocoPhillips is boasting about paying a tax it gets a tax credit for paying!

That says a fair bit about the level of its “evidence”

The committee is on break, so let’s look at some of the NDIS announcements Mark Butler has made in his press club speech.

As AAP reports:

Eligibility will be tightened and financial support reduced as part of sweeping measures designed to rein in spending of the National Disability Insurance Scheme.

Health Minister Mark Butler revealed the changes to the $50 billion scheme in a major address to the National Press Club on Wednesday.

As part of the changes, standardised assessments will be rolled out, with a list of diagnoses no longer the sole standard of access.

The government is aiming to reduce the number of people on the NDIS from about 760,000 now to 600,000 by the end of the 2020s, lower than forecasts of more than 900,000 at current rates.

An advisory group, the disability community, and states and territories will help formulate the eligibility tests.

Those who don’t meet the benchmark for inclusion will be directed to other support services.

“(People have) been told this is the only program available or that this is the help their child needs,” Mr Butler said.

“It is our responsibility to make sure that in the future, these Australians are pointed to the right place.”

The minister also announced that changes will bring the average cost of plans down to $26,000 per year, from $31,000 in 2026.

The plan spend will be in line with levels from 2023.

While the minister said the government had been seeking to reduce growth of the scheme, spending will be reduced to two per cent each year over the next four years, before going back to five per cent in 2030.

Previous changes had sought to get spending down to eight per cent growth.

A $200 million fund will also be set up to rebuild capability in the disability sector among community organisations.

Senator Dean Smith is trying very hard to get the BCA to blame government spending for inflation – to the point where he had to specifically note it in a question because Bran Black went on about productivity. (He also did this yesterday with speakers, including with Konrad Benjamin)

Bran Black finally says yes, government spending has been a cause of higher inflation.

Alas, the data say actually what drove the higher inflation in the last half of 2025 was… profits

Sarah Hanson-Young has been grilling the BCA about its members.

As we know Australians pay more in HECS than the Gas industry pays in PRRT

Why is this an issue for the BCA?

Well the BCA’s members include Macquarie University, Monash University, the University of Sydney, UTS and UNSW. Would those members not prefer more funding for universities? And would they then not benefit from a $17bn tax on gas exports that helped fund universities?

The BCA does not like to talk about such conflicts. Nor did it want to talk about the head of the Commonwealth Bank (also a member of the BCA) saying we should tax gas better.

It would seem today the BCA is not speaking on behalf of all of its members, and it really does not want to say which members it did and did not discuss today’s appearance with

Skye Predavec
Researcher

In short, not really.

In their submission, the Business Council of Australia (BCA) made the claim that in 2021-22 the gas sector “supported about 215,000 full-time equivalent jobs”; luckily, I’ve already fact-checked the report on which this is based, and in short, it’s very misleading.

According to the most recent official data, oil and gas (both extraction and supply) employs around 35,000 people. That’s less than 0.3% of all of Australia’s jobs.

To put that in perspective, retailer Bunnings Warehouse employs over 55,000 people. And far more Australians work as nurses and midwives (over 400,000), or as teachers (over 320,000) than in gas.

How did they get the number?

The 215,000 figure comes from a type of economic modelling called ‘input-output modelling’, which the fossil fuel industry has relied on to overstate its impact for over a decade.

This kind of modelling has been described as ‘‘biased’’ by the Australian Bureau of Statistics, ‘‘abused’’ by the Productivity Commission and ‘‘deficient’’ by the NSW Land and Environment Court.

These models include directly employed people as well as the supply chains for these industries and the flow-on economic impacts of the industry, such as the money its employees might spend at coffee shops or the supermarket, and how many jobs they might support.

There are a bunch of flawed assumptions in these models, but most importantly, the flow-on effects aren’t unique to the gas industry: all businesses buy and sell from wide areas of the economy. If all industries calculated the number of jobs they “support”, it’d add up to more jobs (and even people) than exist in Australia.

It’s incredibly misleading to use these “indirect” employment figures to inflate the supposed impact of the gas sector – especially when they only actually create one in seven of the jobs they claim to “support”.

Verdict: Misleading.

Sarah Hanson-Young has asked Bran Black how many universities are members of the BCA. He will take it on notice but thinks it is five.

So has he considered, in his capacity as the CEO of the Business Council, what the benefits of a gas tax would be for members, including for universities, which are desperately in need of funding.

Well, we would argue that you’ve again, this comes down to that point that I was making before you’ve got to consider the consequences of the different actions that you take. So you might say, on the one hand, sure, we’ll impose a tax and we’ll get some money in the short term, but consider the long term consequences. The long term consequences are less investment, less revenue, and ultimately reduced capacity to deliver precisely the same services.

SHY: Even if that was, was the case, Mr. Black, and we’ve got the case, well, we’ve got evidence showing otherwise, actually, but there’s plenty of evidence that says precisely, it’s a contested point. It’s a contested point. And what I’m asking for is, have you just, have you considered what the benefits to your members and to the broader Australian public would be for an extra of an extra $17 billion a year of government revenue?

Black:

Senator, I think it is absolutely clear that in circumstances where you change the tax arrangements that apply to a company after they’ve made investment assumptions, then you are undermining the capacity, not just for that sector, but for other sectors to have confidence. That’s the fundamental proposition that we have here at play.

SHY: Members of other sectors saying it’s about time. It’s about time the gas industry had to pay for the gas that they use to make their profits, and not just in a bumper year, not just when PRRT kicks in and it’s a bumper crop.

He’s going to take the other questions on notice.

Morgan Harrington

In his speech to the National Press Club, Mark Butler has talked about “reducing the cost of third party intermediaries” in “a market designed to create competition” that is “frankly not working.”

He has railed against predatory, organised criminals rorting the system for financial advantage – which is of course abhorrent. But should anyone be surprised that people are taking advantage of a profit driven system when we have seen private markets fail miserably to help Australians in aged care, child care, and unemployment?

Perhaps the problem is not the “management” of the private market that has been created for Australians with disability, but that Australia relies on a private market to care about people with a disability in the first place.

Bran Black won’t tell Sarah Hanson-Young what his members have said about this issue. He also won’t talk about what members the BCA has consulted with.

He also won’t say whether the BCA has spoken about this issue at the board level.

“You’re not ASIO,” Sarah Hanson-Young says.

He takes the questions on notice. Hanson-Young says she expects as answer and embarrassment is not a reason not to answer.

David Pocock is now asking about this modelling that all the gas companies and the BCA referred to :

It shows that the PRRT is 38% but an export tax is just 25%. So he is saying if we replaced the PRRT with a gas export tax, the industry would pay less!

The BCA is very quickly distancing itself from the modelling

Just on those long term trends, here are some of the points Ketan Joshi has been making:

Solar’s rise was 18 times larger than that of gas, the only fossil fuel that increased in 2025. Global solar generation is now the same size as the total electricity demand of the EU

“Solar power increased by a record 636 TWh to reach 2,778 TWh in 2025, a 30% increase from 2024. This new solar generation would be sufficient to displace gas-fired electricity equivalent to all LNG exports through the Strait of Hormuz last year, estimated at 550 TWh

– China and India (two of Australia’s biggest coal and gas customers) were behind a global decline in fossil fuel use for power generation: Asia is leading the early stages of a coal / gas exit. 

– Globally EVs are already displacing 1.8 mbd of oil (in case “Aus needs to dig up more oil” comes up) 

– Australia added so much battery power it can shift more than 50% of solar power generation to a different time of day (!!!!) – this is something that massively cuts into gas power in Australia

– Japan saw a HUGE drop in gas use in its power grid from 2024 to 2025

The BCA’s arguments are pretty much the same as we have heard anytime a tax is proposed for the fossil fuel industry – investment would fall, supply would fall, energy security would be at risk, we would disappoint international partners, the sky would fall in, and the gas industry already pays enough tax.

So there is nothing new here. And that is something people should take note of. Because there is nothing new here – it is the same arguments over and over and over again.

David Pocock wants to know how many gas companies the BCA represents.

Bran Black doesn’t know.

Pocock then wants to know why the BCA doesn’t want to support a policy that others like the CBA boss support, because it would help lower energy costs as well as provide money to diversify the economy:

I think it comes down to how you strike the right balance. So I appreciate, on the one hand, that everybody wants to see low prices, and that’s certainly what we’re pushing for as well. That’s why we support, as I’ve mentioned, the idea of a prospective gas reservation. But on the other hand, you’ve got to think through what are the long term consequences of the policy choices that we make and what we see, and what we’ve heard directly from our own engagement, is that if we undermine the assumptions that have led to very significant capital investments being made, we won’t get further capital investments of that nature, or will compromise our capacity to deliver those similar types of capital investments. And in turn, what that means, as I mentioned, we’ll have less supply and we’ll have less scope for growth. So I entirely accept the proposition that we have to do what we can to try and put downward on.on prices but we have to balance that with the need to ensure that we can continue to deliver long term supply a long term economic opportunity for the country and that’s really where the BCA comes from our policy perspective, are always about what do we think is genuinely the long term interest in Australia.

But when you look at how other nations are starting to accelerate how they unhook from gas, because they want their own energy security, is this really in the long term interest for Australia?

Rod Campbell

The BCA have just come out with gas “keeping the lights on”, “fundamentally different to Norway” and “reliable investment destination”.

BINGO!!!!

Shell was also trying to suggest the ATO didn’t really say it, they were just making a “technical comment”.

But that’s the thing about tax – it’s all technical.

And being technical does not mean it was wrong.

In 2019 the ATO said the oil and gas sector were systemic non-payers of tax.

The AFR – hardly the enemy of big business put it in their headline.

Did Shell Oil or any other gas company demand AFR take down the headline? Did they complain to the Australian Press Council. Did they write to the ATO saying that was unfair and incorrect?

Nope.  But they do like to blame us for not forgetting that the ATO said it and making sure as many Australians know it as well.

I guess we should apologise for making the gas industry sad.

Rod Campbell

The boss of the Business Council of Australia is telling the senate committee about his recent trip to Korea and Japan. “We need to always present as the most attractive place to do business.” That kind of thing.

What he doesn’t say is that when Australia rejected Korean-backed coal mines, this didn’t affect the Australia-Korea relationship and it resulted in Korea bringing forward its coal phase out by ten years.

A gas tax will not affect our relationships with Japan and Korea, and it can help reduce overall fossil fuel use.

You might have seen some swipes at the Australia Institute there from the Shell exec.

It comes from the AFR’s headline

The quote in article is that “ a small number of firms were “systemic non-payers. They do cover all sectors of the economy and industry sectors. There are some notable sectors in that population though, and one of those sectors that we do expect to see transitioning from this loss phase is the oil and gas sector.”

So sorry but yes the ATO was saying that oil and gas were systemic non-payers of tax.

I mean we could show some facts. eg Santos

Or ICHTHYS LNG

Or the Qld LNG sector

Morgan Harrington

Mark Butler has started his address to the National Press Club of Australia, where he is expected to announce plans to cut spending on the National Disability Insurance Scheme. When it was first introduced in 2013, it was estimated that 400,000 people would take up its services, but it now has about 760,000 participants. A 2011 Productivity Commission report estimated that the annual cost of the NDIS would be $19.5 billion; it now costs more than $50 billion. But a report by Per Capita found that for every $1 spent on the NDIS, $2.25 is returned to the economy, and that the total economic benefit of the scheme if over $50 billion.

Meanwhile, this blog has been covering the Senate inquiry into the taxation of gas resources. Research shows that a 25% tax on gas exports could have raised over $69 billion since July 2022, which would go some of the way to covering the NDIS bill. The Australian Government has also committed $368 billion for nuclear submarines from the United States of America (with no guarantee they will ever be delivered). Questions about budget allocations are questions about democratic society. Do we want to give money away to big industry? Spend money on war? Or invest in the health of Australians?

Cecile Wake is also from the school of ‘I am not angry, I am just disappointed’ school of executive defence.

She is positioning herself as the rational and calm person in the room, keeping her voice calm and even, and constantly pointing out that she is ‘trying to answer a question’ when she is interrupted for trying to deflect a question.

Sarah Hanson-Young has a teenager though, so she is very well practiced in how to deal with deflected answers and attempts to paint the questions themselves as being unreasonable.

Wake is obviously getting annoyed – she has been asked what would a 25% tax on exports would mean for Shell. Wake can’t answer that though, because despite all her claims of ‘good character’ and ‘transparency’ did not come to the senate committee with the export revenue figures. Just the expenses.

Cecile Wake, gas executive, is very big on ‘character’ and what she considers to be ‘good character’ and ‘bad character’ of the individuals involved in this ‘debate’. She paints herself as having ‘good character’. Here is how she defines it.

David Pocock asks:

I was interesting if you could reflect on what it says about a company’s character when they argue that a windfall profit tax, a tax on profits that you weren’t expecting, that are generated because of something totally out of your control, would stop you investing in Australia. What does that say about a company that would make that threat?

Wake:

I would call it an observation, rather a threat number one, and by implication, your question have myself having made that observation. By implication, your question goes to my character as well, and so I’ll I’ll seek to answer it evenly. Despite that, I think that it is a sign of good character, of integrity, to transparently disclose the is the potential unintended consequences of a windfall tax viewed through the prism of what has actually happened in practice in other jurisdictions where those taxes have been applied to transparently and honestly share that perspective and that insight with people who are going to be weighing it up.

I think that is a sign of high good character. High character.

I think it is a sign of poor character to selectively take elements of another country’s fiscal settings, and assert that that is a like for like comparison with Australia, without revealing the other side of that equation around the downside protections, the high state participation, all of the other factors and and so I think actually, you know, character and integrity are important to me, as I know they they are to you. And so I’m very comfortable that that being transparent about those impacts, allowing yourselves and the other member of parliament to make genuinely informed decisions from a broader range of perspectives than you might otherwise have. That’s a sign of a healthy democracy, and it’s a sign of good character.

Companies do not have ‘good character’ or ‘bad character’. They are not people. They are corporations. And corporations are made up of a whole heap of individuals who are paid to protect the company. Which has nothing to do with character. So greenwashing for example, is to try and ensure that people don’t feel anger towards a corporation, which would then negatively impact on its potential investors or dividends. However, it is a very strong personal argument to claim that all of this is about ‘character’.

As Shell continues its spruiking of how tough the industry is doing, Ampol has just released an update to the ASX of how much its margin is at the Lytton Refinery has changed.

This time last year it was US$6.07 a barrel, now it is US$25.45 a barrel! A 319% increase!

There’s a reason why Ampol (and other oil gas companies) have done very well since the Iran War

David Pocock has pointed out that Shell is very big on talking about its expenses, but can’t actually tell him what its revenue is.

Shell is going to take that on notice.

Rod Campbell

Again, the claim that farmers love CSG! “We’ve transformed these communities,” Shell just said…”taking it down to the grass roots, football and netball teams”.

As discussed yesterday, industry-funded research found that CSG made not just the environment and community WORSE, but also financially worse. Here’s what respondents thought about local financial capital from 5 years before and during gas development:

Shell Oil is trying to make a big deal out of how the liquefaction process of gas into LNG is not a deductible for the PRRT

And Susan McDonald was look ohh wow, let’s come back to that.

Well here’s the thing – the PRRT is not a tax on LNG it is a tax on gas.

PRRT is paid on the profit paid from gas companies selling gas to LNG companies (which quite handily are often the same company).

The profits from LNG are not applicable to PRRT, which is why the cost of turning gas into LNG is not a deductible for the PRRT. And it is also why a gas export tax is much better than the PRRT because it actually captures the true revenue of the exports.

Rod Campbell

The inquiry keeps getting told by gas industry types (and LNP Senators) that Norway and Qatar are “fundamentally different”.

Sure, the systems are different, but FUNDAMENTALLY, we are the same. We dig oil and gas out of the ground and sell it overseas.

The fundamental difference is that Australia gets far less money.

Qatar and Australia sell the same amount of gas. Qatar gets five times more money. (Norway is more oil-focussed)

That is the fundamental difference.

Cecile Wake earlies said that “The contention that was… has been made repeatedly, is that our hard working nurses, doctors and other others pay more tax”

Firstly no one has ever included doctors – it would not be a shock that some of the highest paid people in Australia apay a lot of tax. But nurses are decidedly not well paid. But that have paid more tax over the past decade

The gas industry is working really, really hard to claim that our current fuel security and energy security is HEAVILY reliant on there NOT being any changes to the export tax settings for Australian gas. REALLY hard. It’s in a lot of major media, and a lot of people are falling for it, just as they fell for the claims royalties would destroy mining investment, just as they fell for a carbon charge (which was once a Howard policy – he went to the 2007 election with an ETS policy) would destroy mining and also increase energy prices.

You do have to ask how many times apparently ‘serious’ people, who claim to understand politics better than most, will fall for this sort of stuff. They are usually the same people telling you there is no other choice but to cut the NDIS growth funding, because that is ‘reasonable’ and ‘rational’.

And these people run our conversations and gatekeep what appears in our media. GOOD TIMES.

Rod Campbell

As Shell execs step up to the Senate inquiry, it seems a good time to review this 2021 piece from WA journo Peter Milne.

The headline says it all really.

There has been a back and forth between Cecile Wake, Country Chair and EVP Integrated Gas Australia from Shell and Greens senator Steph Hodgins-May about how much export tax says.

Wake does a Fraudian slip in the beginning of her answer and says:

What I would say to you is that it is uncontrovertibly untrue to say that our hard working nurses pay less tax than Australian gas companies.

Which – yes. It is untrue to say they pay less tax than Australian gas companies pay in export taxes.

So then she corrects herself:

The contention that was has been made repeatedly, is that our hard working nurses, doctors and other others pay more tax

And then Wake says:

The vast majority of the taxes that Australian gas companies pay are attributable to the revenue generated through those export projects. And so I think we can say that therefore, the vast majority of the $21.9 billion of tax that our industry paid last year export tax is is attributable to LNG exports.

Last year, Wake says Shell paid $109m in PRRT. Asked what its profit was, her colleague jumps in.

Coralie Trotter, Head of Tax Asia Pacific and Middle East says: “The profit before tax for that year was 2.5 billion.”

Wake then moves on to the PRRT

For the previous decade, we were constructing projects and ramping up through startup where the revenues were not in excess $0 in the previous decade in PRRT. That is correct, nurses and doctors and teachers are paying more tax in income tax than shall paid in PRRT in a decade. So I really do think that that is an incredibly valid point for the reasonable person across Australia.

The argument being that the projects were in a start up stage and so were not paying tax on profits.

And then it is back to corporate tax, which, as Hodgins-May points out, every corporation pays.

Skye Predavec
Researcher

Shell, one of the world’s largest fossil fuel companies, is not new to the oil business. So when they tell you that a 25% tax on gas exports would put investments at risk, you might expect they’re drawing on a wealth of experience.

As it turns out, you’d be right. This isn’t the first time they’ve expressed outrage at a country’s proposed new tax on its own resources.

Back in 1974, with prices buoyed by supply restrictions in the Middle East, Norway’s oil boom was in full swing. And their Labour government wanted to make sure the country’s citizens got the benefits of the natural resources they collectively owned.

As Professor Einar Lie of the University of Oslo told The Tyee in 2012,

“At the time, oil companies in Norway were being taxed at about 50 per cent. In 1974, Norwegian officials summoned Exxon, Shell and others to a meeting and informed them the new petroleum law would raise taxes to close to 90 per cent. Representatives of the world’s most powerful industrial sector were not pleased.

When the yelling died down, the hard-nosed minister of finance at the time noted that none of the companies present had surrendered their oil concessions. He then reportedly turned to his bureaucrats and said in full view of enraged oil executives, “We should have taken more.”

According to Lie, “They were furious when they heard about the new taxation law. And then they started a media campaign saying that they would leave Norway and that it was impossible to work in a socialist country like this that does not understand the rules of international capitalism.”

Sound familiar?

But in all the furore, and even with a new higher rate of taxation, none of the oil companies left Norway. In fact, Shell has made huge investments in Norway’s oil and gas fields since then and extracted 4.9 billion cubic metres of Norwegian gas in 2024.

As for political consequences of the move, the Norwegian Labour government was re-elected in a landslide, their best result in the last 50 years.

Shell has made these kinds of threats before. And when history repeats itself, it’s first as tragedy, second as farce.

As Shell Oil talks about how sad it is that the gas industry has been demonised, let us just remind you of this from the ATO in 2019

Shell Oil are now up and as we showed earlier, they pay no company tax from their QLD operations and as for PRRT, lol no.

They have not paid any PRRT yet on the massive Gorgon Project off WA.

Back in 2021 they suggested they would never pay any PRRT on it, now they say they will.

The reason for this change was also given back in 2021 when they noted that “To the extent assumptions regarding future profitability change, there can be an increase or decrease in the amounts recognised in respect of deferred tax assets as well as in the amounts recognised in income in the period in which the change occurs”

All of that is a garbled way of saying if gas prices go up, they might have to pay PRRT because the profits they’ll make will be more than they expect.

And guess what – in 2022 Russia invaded Ukraine and up went gas prices.

As it is though they don’t anticipate paying much PRRT from the Gorgon project.

And this is the big problem with a “windfall profits tax” – do we really want to only get any returns when we have Russia Invading Ukraine or the USA and Israel bombing Iran?

Greens senator Sarah Hanson-Young asks the QRC CEO why her arguments are the same as previous arguments – when they argued any revenue changes would mean the world was falling (and it didn’t)

SHY:

Listening to a number of your answers and comments today. It feels to me this is the exact same argument that you have run every time there has been a suggestion to get a fairer tax deal on gas resources or any other form of fossil fuel resources, the Queensland resources council back in 2022, when the Miles government decided to increase royalties, you ran exactly the same argument, and I’m just going to quote your your chief executive at the time, imposing higher taxes on our sector is short term political decision to plug a hole in the state budget, negative impact for foreign investment and confidence in our industry.

You said the Queensland resources sector has come out fighting in response to the state government’s plans to impose higher coal royalties. Could I ask you, is there more or less coal mines in Queensland since 2022

Hewson:

Thanks, senator for your question and for raising the coal royalties, because I think it’s a really good example of what happens.

SHY:

Are there more? Are there more or less coal mines today than there were in 2022

Hewson:

I don’t have the precise number in front of me.

SHY:

Luckily, I do. Luckily I do. So let me, let me. Let me tell you, in 2022 there were 53 there’s now 58 it’s gone up. It’s gone up. So imposing this royalty did not reduce the number of coal mines.

Hewson: Senator, I’d need to look at those stats, and I’m happy to take that on notice and come back to the committee on it. Obviously, I’ve come here today to talk about gas.

SHY: It’s the same old trope. It’s the same old trope argument. You industry almost your comments today have almost been word for word from what your executive, chief executive said four years ago, almost word for word. It’s the same old argument. You just don’t like having to pay a fair share of tax.

Hewson: I think fair share of tax is the relevant discussion around coal waterings. What we say is it’s not a fair share, because what we’re seeing, and Senator, I’d have to look at those numbers, and I’m happy to come back to the committee on this, but we often see replacement replacement pits or replacement mines. What we have seen, though, is through the Queensland Government statistics that were or data that was released in for up to December of last year, we’ve seen a million tons come out of the Queensland coal industry in terms of production, and there’s also a significant drop. When you compare it to 10 years ago. We do know that there’s more mines, there’s more structural decline in terms of demand, but what we are seeing is that the royalties regime has meant that the industry is now in structural decline.

SHY: Well, that might have something to do, that might have something to do more about whether the world is getting off coal. In 2010 there were, there were 48 coal mines in Queensland in 2024 there were 58 it it has gone up. It has not gone down.

Rod Campbell

The Queensland Resource Council are squirming under questioning by David Pocock around teachers and nurses paying more tax than Santos.

The QRC then claim that their members’ gas royalties actually pay the wages of Queensland teachers and nurses.

Looking at the Qld budget papers, the $1.2 billion in gas royalties represents just 1% of the Queensland Government’s $91 billion budget.

So great, gas companies pay for 1% of Queensland’s teachers and nurses. The rest of us pay the remaining 99%.

Senator Pocock is asking the QRC about how little tax the Santos and other pay.

The QRC again talks about royalties *WHICH ARE NOT TAXES!!!)

But here’s the facts about the Queensland gas industry – some of whom will be appearing today

David Pocock:

You said earlier in response to question that companies pay a lot of corporate tax and that Australians get a return when prices go up, according to the Australian Taxation Office data Santos has paid zero income tax in Australia for 10 consecutive years as of 2023/24 despite generating nearly $47 billion in revenue during this period. What do you say to Australian teachers and nurses who are personally paying more tax than Santos?

Janette Hewson:

I would say that Australians are very hard working, and I acknowledge the efforts of the teachers and nurses that you talk about, and our industry is very proud, particularly with the royalties and taxes that We pay that contributes to providing those services for Australians. I would say that Australia does benefit from a successful oil and gas industry. Here in our country, it does enjoy the benefits of company tax, payroll tax, state royalties, and you know, it’s a significant contributor. It’s paid nearly $22 billion in taxes, and it’s the second largest corporate taxpayer in terms of that particular company. I can’t comment on their financials, but I do know that all companies contribute significant amounts of capital to invest and our taxation laws just is, if you’re a regular individual as well, if you’re investing or you’ve got some capital deduction, then the taxation system recognises that investment.

Pocock:

I wouldn’t say it recognises that for your average punter. And just to come back to the question, I don’t expect you to comment on Santos financials. I’m just going from the ATO data. They’ve sold $47 billion worth of Australian gas, and they haven’t paid a single cent in corporate tax. How is that their fair share? If you’re pushing the line that industry is paying its fair share, how is $47 billion of revenue, $0 of corporate tax. How’s that a fair share?

Hewson:

I don’t I don’t have Santos financials in front of me, Senator, so…

Pocock: I don’t need you to I’m just quoting the ATO.

Sarah Hanson-Young: It’s a pretty basic question, Does it sound fair? Clearly it doesn’t.

Hewson:

You need to look at the overall picture. And that’s hopefully the message that I’m leaving with the committee today, which is you’ve got to look at the overall picture. So there’s company tax, there’s payroll tax, there’s state laws for some I can’t end on. I don’t have it in front of me, so I’m pretty uncomfortable making a comment on whether that is sliced and diced in a particular way. What I can say is that this is the second largest corporate tax payer…

Pocock:

The thing I hear from a lot of Australians is that they are growing very tired of hearing from a gas industry that wants to pat itself on the back for paying payroll tax. I mean, every big business pays payroll tax. Well, what we’re talking about here are the raw materials, this finite resource that belongs to all Australians, that a company like Santos can export $47 billion worth of gas and pay $0 in corporate tax. And so I guess just finally, what, what do you think is a fair share for our gas? What is there? Is there a number? Is there a percentage, like of of the total gas exported? Call it 100 billion. How many billion should Australians receive? What’s a fair, what’s a fair share?

Hewson:

My view is that if through, through existing taxation, through royalties, through economic contributions, through paying wages, all Australians benefit from our industry. Senator, and this notion of, I mean, we should thank the gas company for paying people’s wages. I mean…

Sarah Hanson-Young: How ridiculous! We should THANK the gas industry for paying wages?

Hewson:

My comment is about the fact that Australians need jobs, and they need really well paid jobs, and they need companies to invest in order to make those job opportunities. I acknowledge the job opportunities that other industries also bring

David Pocock is trying to get to whether or not any of the members of the QRC have complained or raised concerns about Santos buying up domestic supply and selling it on the international spot market, which has increased the cost of domestic gas.

Janette Hewson is doing the Simone Biles of verbal gymnastics to avoid answering the question:

You can imagine that every company has different business models, and the LNG developments were all created with different business models. But I would, I would recommend, probably having that conversation directly with the companies, but the view is that we need to make sure that we’ve got more supply, because more supply means that we’ve got the availability here in Australia to have that domestic supply, which is so critical, and also more supply means a downward pressure on costs for consumers and for industry

You don’t need more supply if companies stop selling domestic gas on the international spot market.

The QRC and Susan McDonald have been talking up how the gas industry ahs been an absolutely boom for jobs the regions

Alas the data does not back this up.

The employment to population ration of jobs in Central Queensland (which include Gladstone) used to be higher than greater Brisbane, now it is equal

Now maybe that’s because lots of families have moved there to take advantage of all the jobs.

But now, the employment growth of jobs in Central Queensland has been less than in Greater Brisbane since the Gladstone terminal opened

There is no sign the LNG industry is delivering a boost to jobs in the regions – if anything the job growth in Central Queensland is less than in Brisbane, which is a long way from the gas fields…

Rod Campbell

Could be a long day on the fact checks! In their opening statement, the QRC claimed:

“Queensland’s oil and gas sector contributed $21.7 billion to our state’s economy”.

The word “contribution” is doing a lot of work here. Like similar claims we’ve debunked before, this includes profits to foreign gas companies and is based on a form of economic modelling that the Australian Bureau of Statistics says in “biased” and the Productivity Commission says is “abused”.

Gas royalties to Queensland are expected to be $1.2 billion this year. (p64)

The QRC are now arguing that ALL Australians are ‘benefitting’ from higher gas prices.

Are those Australians in the room with us now?

Janette Hewson, Chief Executive Officer of the QRC says:

Our view is that there’s state based royalty schemes working. The corporate tax is working because the oil and gas industry is Australia’s second largest corporate taxpayer, and that the flow on environment, flow on economic benefits that the industry brings, injects that much needed money into local industries, local communities, and results in those 94,000 really well paid and secure jobs. So for us, it’s about we’re unsure why there is a need to to add a new tax at the moment, because we believe that the company, through the company tax structure, through the Queensland royalty scheme, all Australians are benefiting from higher prices at a time when you do have higher prices, and we don’t always have higher prices.

This is a cyclical industry where there are higher pricing times, but there’s also lower pricing times and ordinary pricing times. So we just don’t understand what what the problem is that this is meant to solve, we just see it actually resulting in a decreasing in taxation revenue base, which is of concern to the fed the federal government, as well as to state governments, as well as creating a lot of uncertainty and probably reducing supply when we do need gas. We need gas for the transition. We need gas for manufacturing, and our trading partners rely on us, and we rely on them for our liquid fuel security

One of the other arguments being made here, is that it is the Australian people’s job to ensure that investors – who are taking a risk – have that risk paid off. So essentially, the argument is, that the Australian people must pay to make sure that investors taking a risk that a project will reap rewards, get their big dividends.

That is not how investment works. It is a risk. There is no guarantee. There is no onus on landlords to make money from their property investment (despite what we are told) and there is no onus on taxpayers, who pay for exploration and subsidies for the gas industry, to suffer to ensure that the gas industry maximise its profits for its investors.

Janette Hewson:

So that the concern we have is that you impose a new tax that’s going to affect existing operators, existing taxpayers who are already contributing, as I’ve said, but also it’s going to cause people to pause on, will I start a new project? And particularly when we’re looking at the export tax,
companies will look at that and go, ‘Well, what does that mean to the financials of this project? Does this mean that things will stack up’ and it just brings a lot of uncertainty and risk to investors, and investors are risking their capital.

…Our view is that the the market review that’s currently underway is an important an important time to to assess what needs to occur in that domestic reservation space. So we’ve provided a submission previously to government on that where we’re comfortable in terms of domestic reservations, but it’s just got to apply equitably and fairly and without retrospective operation. And that’s the issue with when new taxes are suggested or mooted. How does all this apply to existing investment and new investment? And I also want to raise the point about whenever Australia makes a material change or a signpost that change is coming, it does have ramifications to our Asian trading partners, and we’ve seen that in recent years, particularly with the Japanese investors in government coming out and talking about their concerns that these changes, that what happens here in Australia will actually impact the future supply to their nation, who are heavily dependent upon imported energy.

OK, now that my laptop has decided it actually does have enough memory to DO IT’S JOB let’s head into the inquiry where the QRC has been outlining all the reasons Grogs has pointed out from its submission of why it just can’t pay any more taxes actually.

Janette Hewson, Chief Executive Officer of the QRC says:

Ultimately investment decisions have to be proven and that means not only is the resource there, but that the financial stack up for companies to invest their fairly limited capital. And our concern is that by putting in what appears to be a fairly punitive revenue based tax, that that’s going to actually produce investment, because the financials just won’t stick up, and there could be some marginal projects done some analysis, where it just they just wouldn’t get off the ground and that means no jobs, no local supply supplier opportunities and more limited taxation base overall.

Uh huh. Suuurrre. That’s why there is so much profit being made. All those very marginal projects with very little capital, just happening to equate to lots of money in the selling side.

This is both very funny and very stupid. But it is also something every gas company loves to talk about.

The QRC notes that gas companies pay royalties

“Queensland’s oil and gas royalty regime provides reliable government revenue ($1.7 billion in 2023-24 and 2024-25 and projected to remain strong over forward estimates), captures benefits to government from higher gas prices, includes gas exports, and is simple and fair to administer”

But here’s the thing

ROYALTIES ARE NOT TAXES

The gas is owned by Queenslanders – that’s why royalties are paid.

Think of it this way – if a property developer came along and wanted to build a high-rise apartment on Crown land, would you expect the property developer to get the land for free? Of course not. Would you think the property developer paying for the land is a “tax”? Again, of course not. But that’s what the gas industry wants you to think.

Royalties are a business cost. And while they pay royalties for gas in Queensland (because it is mostly all onshore fracking) they do not pay PRRT.

This is the big thing. The boom in LNG exports form Gladstone has not led to any PRRT.

The only reason all that fracking occurred in QLD is to export as LNG.

Fine, let’s tax it!

But here’s the QRC’s argument:

“Any attempt to apply a federal export tax to onshore gas extraction would be a direct attack on Australia’s federal system of government. Onshore gas resources are legitimately the Jurisdiction of state governments.

The introduction of an extra federal gas tax on top of the royalty system would amount to double taxation for the onshore gas industry.”

Double taxation???

Look, just again for those at the back

ROYALTIES ARE NOT TAXES!!!

Also oil and gas don’t pay a lot of royalties. Gamblers and drivers in Queensland pay more than do oil and gas companies

They suggest that

“In the current environment of conflict, heightened global instability, and real and present risks to global energy security, Queensland’s oil and gas industry is uniquely positioned to support the Australian community and our export partners through a reliable supply of energy from Queensland’s oil and gas industry. New taxes will discourage future investment in replacement and new supply at a time when Australia needs to be more self-sufficient in its production and supply”

OK just a reminder.

WE DO NOT HAVE A SHORTAGE OF GAS!

Also we are not about to have a shortage of gas even when we include contracted gas exports as our analysis of the govt’s Future Gas Strategy showed

Our exports partners will not be affected by this tax. They will not pay one cent more for gas. All that will happen is foreign gas companies will get less after-tax profit.

We have plenty of gas to export for many, many years – indeed if the world does move to net zero by 2050, there is going to be more gas to be exported than is demanded.

That is the big woof the gas companies – they think the good time in the market is going to dry up in 15 years or so and they are desperate to get all the profits they can now.

First up this morning in the gas committee is the Queensland Resources Council, which is the lobby group for mining and gas in Queensland.

Their submission was full of “ooh look how great gas is” and a lot of exaggerated figures.

For example they start of by claiming that

“The oil and gas sector alone contributed $21.7 billion to Queensland’s economy in 2024-25, supported more than 94,000 local jobs in Queensland, and directly spent $6.4 billion supporting 3,650 businesses and 462 community organisations.”

The key words are “supported”

As we know from yesterday, in February there were only 24,900 people employed nationally in oil and gas extraction and in Queensland that numbers fall to 8,000.

So how do they get to 94,000? Well by the magic of “supporting” – think of it like “serving suggestion” on the front of any package of frozen meal – it adds in a lot of things that really are not there.

They add up the jobs that they support through spending.

On the QRC’s webpage they put it like this “For instance, when a resource company buys a vehicle (direct spending), the dealership’s income increases (indirect spending).” So that means they can add in the jobs in the dealer because the gas industry supports it!

It’s a great way to inflate numbers and the fun thing is every industry did it we would probably have about 5 times the number of jobs being supported in Australia as there are people!

The interview ends on Rabbitohs v Storm this weekend.

Asked about what can be done to get Donald Trump to stop the war, Anthony Albanese says:

We want to see talks resume. We want to see this conflict come to an end. We’ve made that very clear because of the human impact that it is having, but also the directly in that region, but also the economic impact. on the global economy is quite extraordinary. It’s a reminder of how interconnected we are.

Pushed on what Australia can actually do, Albanese turns to the US talking points on Iran.

Well, we are not participants. But importantly, here is the actions of Iran, who continue to resist calls to end their nuclear program*, and it is vital that Iran not get a nuclear weapon. It’s vital as well. Iran has fired on on civilian ships, and have continued to attack countries in the Gulf that were not participants in this war.**

*US Intelligence says there has been no moves by Iran to reinstate its nuclear program, after the US-Israel bombing disabled it last year. This war the US and Israel started came AFTER the nuclear program was already disabled.

**The US and Israel have done this too.

Anthony Albanese has called in to ABC radio Sydney where he is talking about what he has done to secure fuel – including working with BHP to find more diesel. (BHP are the biggest user of diesel in Australia, which is why whenever someone says to you the diesel fuel subsidy is about farmers, you know it is bullshit).

Albanese is announcing the government has secured additional supply of fuel – we now have more fuel in storage than we did before the US and Israel attacked Iran, leading to the closure of the Strait of Hormuz.

Albanese says Australia will not be changing any of its sanctions on Russia, even if it means securing fuel:

Our position is very clear on on Russia because of the illegal and immoral invasion of Ukraine that continues to cause turbulence and almost just for the people of Ukraine, but the implications are there for the international rule of law. So there are many things that are not in our control. We are not participants in the conflict in the Middle East, but that does not mean that we’re immune from the consequences, and the whole world is being impacted by this. Importantly, countries in our region, like the Philippines and Sri Lanka now have have had, now for some weeks, a compulsory public holiday every every week, they have essentially moved to a four day working week to try to deal with the supply shortages, which are there for those countries.

Australia will not be looking at a four day working week.

In other news of ‘why are we being told all of this is impossible to pay for when the gas industry gets subsidies and doesn’t pay its fair share of tax’, there is this from AAP:

Aged care residents won’t have to pay extra for help with basic tasks such as showering and dressing after a backdown by the government.

Changes to aged care, which came into effect in November, required some recipients to pay more for basic support services.

While the reforms were meant to improve the care levels offered, those on Support at Home packages had fees attached to services such as help with showering.

It meant that in some cases, elderly residents were forced to choose between receiving help with showers at the expense of other care and having fewer showers.

Health Minister Mark Butler is set to detail changes to aged care measures, along with reforms to the National Disability Insurance Scheme, in a speech to the National Press Club on Wednesday.

Aged Care Minister Sam Rae said support for showering will now be classed as clinical care and the payments will no longer apply.

“Obviously, older people have made clear that they want showering, they want dressing and continence management considered as clinical care, and that’s the change that we’re making,” he told ABC TV on Wednesday.

“We always said when we were implementing these generational changes that we’d listen to older people and we’d respond to their experiences of the new system.”

The changes to aged care packages stemmed from recommendations from a royal commission into the sector, which was handed down in 2021.

As part of the overhaul, more tiers of home care were introduced to ensure needs were more closely met, while also making wealthier Australians pay more for services.

Mr Rae said while the program had been in place for less than six months, changes needed to be made.

“This system’s only been in place since November. Now’s the time to start making the adjustments to get better outcomes for older people,” he said.

“Aged care does take up a significant part of the budget. It’s a $40 billion system on an annual basis, and it does need to be sustainable.

“Of course, Australians need to have sustainable systems in place when it comes to social care.”

Ageing Australia chief executive Tom Symondson welcomed the decision to scrap payments for help with showering.

“Sweeping reforms will always have unintended consequences, and we’ve been clear from the outset that charging contributions for showering needed to be kept under constant review to ensure the best possible outcomes for older people,” he said.

“Particularly alarming has been the increasing evidence that older people were reducing the number of showers they had or forgoing them altogether due to cost. That is the worst possible outcome.

“Showering is not just about hygiene and health, it’s about basic human dignity.”

(You have to wonder why, in a country as rich as Australia, this was even being considered)

At the end of yesterday Ketan Joshi gave evidence to the committee. Ketan is a research associate here at the Institute, but he gave evidence in a personal capacity. Not only is Ketan pretty much across everything you could need to know about the gas industry, he also happens to live in Norway, and so is able to provide actual proof that it does exist and what life is like in a country which taxes its oil and gas industry.

Ketan mentioned that the Ember’s Global Electricity Review 2026 had just been released yesterday. It noted (among other things)

• Record solar growth meant clean power sources grew fast enough to meet all new electricity demand in 2025, thereby preventing an increase in fossil generation. This was the first year since 2020 without an increase in electricity generation from fossil fuels and only the fifth year without a rise this century.
• Solar power cemented its role as the dominant driver of change in the global power sector, with its record growth meeting three-quarters of the net rise in electricity demand in 2025. Solar’s rise was 18 times larger than that of gas, the only fossil fuel that increased in 2025. Global solar generation is now the same size as the total electricity demand of the EU.
• Renewables overtook coal power in 2025. Solar, wind, hydropower and other renewable sources together contributed more than a third of global electricity generation for the first time in the modern power system. Conversely, the share of coal power fell below a third for the first time in history.
• Chile and Australia installed enough grid-level storage to shift over 50% of new solar generation in 2025 and are already seeing benefits in lower power prices and reduced curtailment.

Ketan talked about how in Norway things like childcare are taken for granted and he remained rather aghast that in Australia – a rich nation – that such things are financial concerns parents have to worry about.

This is just one example of what you can do when you actually tax oil and gas companies.

Our own research found that a 25% flat tax on gas exports would easily cover the cost of free childcare. We actually did have free childcare during the Covid period, and back then Richard Denniss’ and Matt Grudnoff’s research found that had it continued it would have unlocked huge economic potential (not to mention, just be bloody great for the lives of families)

In his submission Ketan noted that while Norway does tax its oil and gas industry (to the tune of 78% when you combined the company tax and its special petroleum tax) it continues to also subsidize the industry.

He noted

“While Norway is rightly seen as a bastion of democracy globally, our great shame is not aligning the fossil fuel industry to the wishes of the public. There is growing support for a major cutback on fossil fuel exploration, as found in a recent report by campaign group Oil

Change International. Yet we continue to spend unreasonable volumes of money subsidising the fossil fuel industry.”

It’s a key point. Just because we want to tax the gas industry, does not mean we want there to be more investment to then also be taxed.

Australia already has more than enough gas being produced. We don’t need anymore gas fields explored or developed, but what there is should – as Richard Denniss noted yesterday – “milked”.

Norway is a good example to follow on tax, but better taxing gas does not mean we stop calling for the end of any new gas.

Hello and welcome to another special edition of The Point Live.

After Konrad Benjamin and Ken Henry set the cat among the gas pigeons yesterday (at least according to the coverage of the committee today) today we have the other side, or the ‘please don’t make us pay tax wahhhhhh’ side. (I do not have to pretend to be objective over something so blatantly ridiculous)

Here is today’s program for those playing along at home:

So that should be a fun day. And we also have Mark Butler at the National Press Club talking NDIS. Which is critically important to understand and also related to our inaction on things like gas and fossil fuel taxes – we could actually pay for the stuff governments tell us they can’t pay for, if they taxed things like gas properly!

Anyways, we will cover it all off, along with a few other bits and bobs.

Ready? It’s a two coffee morning so far, which is still lower than parliament.

Let’s get into it.