Payroll Tax

Dr HARVEY (Newland) (14:20): My question is to the Premier.

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order!

Dr HARVEY: Will the Premier update the house on how scrapping payroll tax for small businesses will create jobs and support businesses in my electorate and across South Australia?

The Hon. S.S. MARSHALL (Dunstan—Premier) (14:21): I will answer that question with a great degree of joy and I thank the member for Newland (the new member for Newland) for his question. I must say I always like going to small businesses in the member's electorate, in particular Nev's Supa Deli. What a fantastic deli this is! It's not just a normal deli, it's not an extraordinary deli, it is a super deli, and I particularly like the refurbishment that they have done there.

What Nev knows at Nev's Supa Deli, like a lot of people in South Australian business, is that taxes are too high. Taxes are too high in South Australia. Unlike those opposite, we have an agenda to lower payroll tax in South Australia. When I'm out talking to small businesses, they say that they would like to employ more people in their business, but of course they need to ensure that their businesses remain viable. By lowering payroll tax, we give business owners the opportunity to employ more people.

This is a very different attitude to the previous government. Previously, the government in South Australia, the Labor Party in South Australia, always said whenever we talked about lowering taxes, always responded, by saying, 'Well, the greedy owners of the business will just pocket all of that money for themselves.' This is the attitude that they had to the people who were out there on a daily basis, trying to put their livelihoods, their assets, their houses on the line to employ people in South Australia.

I tell you one thing, Mr Speaker. For the entire time that we're in government here in South Australia we will be doing everything we can to improve the attractiveness of the business environment here in South Australia. We know on this side of the chamber that not everybody can work for the government. We need a strong private sector in South Australia, and that's why payroll tax will come down. Currently, the threshold for payroll tax in South Australia is $600,000. I think it's the lowest threshold in Australia or the second lowest in Australia. We are going to increase that threshold to $1.5 million so that a business in South Australia that has a payroll of up to $1.5 million will not be paying a cent of payroll tax in South Australia.

We do this because we know that this will create more jobs in South Australia. In the lead-up to the election we on this side of the house said that we wanted to create more jobs, to keep young people in South Australia, and that's precisely what we will be doing.

The SPEAKER: Before I call the leader, the member for West Torrens is warned for a second and final time, and I also warn the leader. The leader has the call.