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House of Assembly - Fifty-Fifth Parliament, First Session (55-1)
2024-03-19 Daily Xml
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General Practitioner Payroll Tax

Mrs HURN (Schubert) (14:34): My question is to the Minister for Health and Wellbeing. Has the minister requested modelling from SA Health on potential impacts that GP payroll tax changes may have on pressure in our emergency departments and on ramping and, if not, why not?

The Hon. S.C. MULLIGHAN (Lee—Treasurer) (14:35): This is exactly the same line of questioning on this that we had last week in parliament when—

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order!

The Hon. S.C. MULLIGHAN: And I provide exactly the same definitive advice to the house as I did back then. Those opposite are running around with all sorts of contentions and conjecture around what the ongoing implementation of longstanding, unchanged, unaltered tax arrangements here in South Australia are.

Mr Cowdrey interjecting:

The Hon. S.C. MULLIGHAN: Oh, the shadow treasurer now might have something to say. Oh my goodness!

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order! The member for Colton! The member for Chaffey!

The Hon. S.C. MULLIGHAN: Imagine outsourcing the treasury portfolio to the shadow minister for health. Just have a go.

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: The member for Morialta!

The Hon. S.C. MULLIGHAN: Just get up and have a go. It's extraordinary. Why bother demanding to be on the front bench when you don't even want a question.

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order!

The Hon. S.C. MULLIGHAN: And if you demand to be on the front bench, actually get on it. It's not rocket science.

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: The member for Morialta is on a final warning.

Members interjecting:

The Hon. S.C. MULLIGHAN: That's right. That's exactly right.

An honourable member interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order!

The Hon. S.C. MULLIGHAN: Anyway, we don't go about these exercises—

Mr Cowdrey interjecting:

The SPEAKER: The member for Colton is on a final warning.

The Hon. S.C. MULLIGHAN: —of modelling additional tax revenue because it has never been about that. And we don't go about modelling those other impacts because we don't believe them to be true.

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Member for Chaffey! Member for Morialta!

The Hon. S.C. MULLIGHAN: We are focused on working with the royal college—

Mrs Hurn: You haven't even asked.

The SPEAKER: The member for Schubert is called to order.

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order! The member for Colton is warned for a second time. The Treasurer has the call.

The Hon. S.C. MULLIGHAN: We are approaching this in a calm, sensible way—

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order!

The Hon. S.C. MULLIGHAN: —with the royal college and with the AMA. We can come in here and have a debate and we can ask questions which are not based in fact or interested in factual answers and you can try to get more information to run your misleading press releases all you want. On this side, we have been dealing with this reasonably with the royal college—

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: The member for Morialta is on a final warning.

The Hon. S.C. MULLIGHAN: —and with the AMA for 12 months. In comparison to New South Wales, which has reconfirmed the longstanding obligation for payroll tax on contractor wages back to 1 July 2018, we, on the other hand, have said that we won't be doing that, there won't be any penalties and there won't be any interest—completely separate from New South Wales and Victoria. In addition to that, as a result of our discussions with the royal college, we have also said that there would be an entire further year, this current financial year, of no payroll tax obligations for those practices that have not been meeting their longstanding legal obligations with regard to the Payroll Tax Act.

We have put those arrangements in place because we have been meeting with the royal college and the AMA over the last 12 months to make sure that we are managing this issue and doing it in a way which is based on fact rather than the fiction of how those opposite have been behaving out in the media. So, if anyone is worried about this issue, you might want to consider the role that the member for Schubert and the member for Colton have been playing in deliberately spreading—

The Hon. J.A.W. GARDNER: Point of order.

The Hon. S.C. MULLIGHAN: —lies and misinformation in the community.

The SPEAKER: There is a point of order which is—

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order! The member for Schubert will cease her exchange with the Treasurer. There is a point of order under 134 which I will hear from the member for Morialta.

The Hon. J.A.W. GARDNER: Standing order 98: the question was about briefings or information that the Minister for Health has or hasn't requested. The Treasurer abusing other members is well outside standing order 98.

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order! If that were the case the individual members would of course be able to approach the Chair under a different standing order. Nevertheless, there is some merit in the matter that has been raised with me. I will listen carefully. The Treasurer, of course, has an enthusiasm for rhetorical devices. If those devices were deployed more sparingly, it may be that there are fewer points of order, but I'm not sure necessarily that that would appeal to the Treasurer. In any case, he has concluded his answer. Very well, we are going to turn to the crossbench. I understand the member for MacKillop is seeking the call.

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order! There is something called the crossbench. You might recognise some of the members—

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order! Order! And they will be recognised in the same way as any other member of the house, member for Flinders, and the member for MacKillop well and truly has the call.

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