General Practitioner Payroll Tax

Mrs HURN (Schubert) (14:32): My question is to the Minister for Health and Wellbeing. Is the government assessing the Queensland approach to GP payroll tax, and could that be rolled out in South Australia?

The Hon. S.C. MULLIGHAN (Lee—Treasurer) (14:32): Of course we are aware of the way in which—

Mr Cowdrey interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Member for Colton!

The Hon. S.C. MULLIGHAN: —changes are being made in other states.

Mrs Hurn interjecting:

The SPEAKER: The member for Schubert is warned.

The Hon. S.C. MULLIGHAN: As I have pointed out, there are states, in particular New South Wales and Victoria, that are being far more punitive than South Australia in how they are choosing to bring GPs into compliance with their existing payroll tax obligations. The member raises what is going on in Queensland. I have to say, I have had this discussion with the royal college, and have also had the discussion with RevenueSA. We are waiting to understand exactly how the Queensland revenue agency intends to apply what the Queensland Treasurer has announced, because, amongst our state's revenue office and amongst local GPs and their representatives, no-one seems quite sure how it would work in practice.

They have sought to make a more beneficial or preferential arrangement for that cohort of GPs in Queensland who are not meeting their payroll tax obligations, but what we have tried to rely on is an appropriate, pragmatic and equitable way of managing this issue within the overall tax base. Those opposite, of course, have had three different positions on this—

Mr Cowdrey interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order! The member for Colton is warned.

The Hon. S.C. MULLIGHAN: —three different positions on this.

Mr Cowdrey interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Member for Colton, your persistent interjections mean that you are on a final warning. The Treasurer has the call.

The Hon. S.C. MULLIGHAN: Those opposite have had three different positions on what should be done here. Firstly, they wanted an amnesty, which the government has granted. Then they wanted a longer amnesty, which of course we pointed out would be inequitable for them. We also had a call from those opposite that there shouldn't be payroll tax on this group of GPs at all in the future, which of course would be unreasonable for those GPs who are already paying payroll tax, let alone the thousands of other medical clinicians—

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order!

The Hon. S.C. MULLIGHAN: —those clinicians—

Mr Cowdrey interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Member for Colton!

The Hon. S.C. MULLIGHAN: —who have been meeting their payroll tax obligations. It would be unequitable—

Mr Cowdrey interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Member for Colton, 137A, for the remainder of question time.

The honourable member for Colton having withdrawn from the chamber:

The SPEAKER: The Treasurer has the call.

The Hon. S.C. MULLIGHAN: Those opposite are all over the shop on this issue. They will say anything in order to get a warm response for who may or may not stand up with them in a media conference, but our responsibility is much deeper. Our responsibility is to manage the state's tax base—

Mrs Hurn interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Member for Schubert!

The Hon. S.C. MULLIGHAN: —fairly and equitably. The normal approach to this would be for Revenue SA to identify a business that has not been meeting its tax obligations, audit them for the last five years, charge them all their tax obligations with penalty and interest, and require them to come into compliance from day one.

As I have repeatedly made it clear to this place, we have, of course, forgone all those obligations and we have done that proactively. Before they could even ask for it through the royal college, we made it clear we would not be doing that to them. Not only that, we have also said we won't be asking you to pay it from day one; you can have a full, in fact it was more than 12 months, to understand your obligations and come into compliance, because we knew it would be unreasonable for us to have very lengthy periods of time, longer than 12 months, where we have one group of GPs and GP clinics paying payroll tax and we have another group that isn't. That is simply unfair.

You can't run a two-pace tax system where some operators get the benefit of a tax holiday and others have to continue meeting their obligations. So we have a fair and pragmatic outcome and I am very pleased for the collegial work of the royal college in helping us arrive at that.