Coalition government is set to stump out over proposed company tax cuts legislation after One Nation refused to support tax cuts for bigger businesses.
Though government won the support for the proposed legislation in the House of Representatives by 75 votes against opposition’s 71, but the proposed legislation destined to garbage as after Labor, Greens and Nick Xenophon team, One Nation also on Thursday refused to go with the government on tax cuts for big corporations.
According to AFR, to pass the Senate, the legislation, which will lower the company tax rate for all corporations from 30 per cent to 25 per cent by 2026-27, needs nine of the 12 crossbench votes. Thus far, the government has the stated support of just three crossbenchers – Cory Bernardi, Fraser Anning and David Leyonhjelm.
Romance between coalition and One Nation served for very short term and exhausted after Queensland elections which resulted a defeat both for One Nation and the Coalition as Liberals/Nationals announced never to join hands with the far right party in future.
Besides One Nation, senators from Greens and Nick Xenophon Team nevertheless in support of tax cut to companies with turnovers capped at $50 million but would not be supporting the remainder of the package.
One Nation’s Senator Pauline Hanson spoke strongly against tax cut for big businesses in Parliament other day.
“One Nation has already supported tax rate cuts for businesses with a turnover of up to $50 million, but I draw the line at that. What we need are incentives for businesses to invest in Australia and tax rate cuts are not the answer.”
She also dismissed comparisons with the US where the company tax rate has just been slashed to 21 per cent saying a tax rate comparison between countries is ridiculous when the new system in America restricts deductions but in Australia deductions are unlimited.
She also disagreed with the suggestion that failure to lower business income tax rates would render Australia uncompetitive.
