Prime Minister says WA’s GST deal won’t change while he is in top job<\/a><\/p>\nPrime Minister Anthony Albanese reiterates there will be no change to Western Australia’s GST arrangements after a report recommended scrapping the existing deal.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Mr Albanese is set to meet with state leaders at national cabinet on Wednesday, putting him on a collision course with premiers demanding a GST shake-up.<\/p>\n
Victoria’s Labor Treasurer Colin Brooks said the Productivity Commission’s interim findings had “backed up exactly what Victoria has been saying for years”.<\/p>\n
“The current system isn’t working \u2014 it leaves other states like Victoria exposed and goes against the core purpose of fair distribution,” he said.<\/p>\n
Queensland’s LNP Treasurer David Janetzki also hit out at the existing funding arrangements, saying his state was looking for a “consistent approach”.<\/p>\n
“I do have concerns that the inequity of the GST distribution, the consistent cost shifting from the federal government to the state government, is threatening the integrity of the federation,” he said.<\/p>\n
“If the prime minister shows up for Western Australia and acknowledges their unique character as a resources state, the same should be applied to Queensland.”<\/p>\n
Tasmania’s Liberal Treasurer Eric Abetz warned his state faced possible significant reductions in GST revenue unless the 2018 decision was reversed.<\/p>\n
“Australia was built on a simple concept \u2014 a fair go. This sense of fairness is what underpinned GST when it was first introduced,” he said.<\/p>\n
“The prime minister has told the nation that doesn’t exist anymore. Western Australia has been told it can keep its lucrative and disproportionate deal.”<\/p>\n
PM defends WA deal<\/p>\n
On a visit to Western Australia on Monday, Mr Albanese said the state deserved its funding allocation and promised no changes while he was prime minister.<\/p>\n
It was the first time he had made the guarantee since the Productivity Commission handed down its interim report earlier this month.<\/p>\n
“The important thing that sometimes isn’t understood from some of the critique of WA getting its fair share of the GST is that those additional payments have not come from states and territories,” Mr Albanese said.<\/p>\n
“They have come from the Commonwealth. I am comfortable with that.<\/p>\n
“What I say to premiers and chief ministers, though, is that you need to bear that in mind when you’re discussing federal-state financial relations.”<\/p>\n
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Anthony Albanese says WA deserves its funding allocation.\u00a0 (ABC News: Keane Bourke)<\/p>\n
Mr Albanese’s announcement was welcomed by Western Australia Premier Roger Cook, who previously lashed out at “east-coast clowns” when the Productivity Commission report was released.<\/p>\n
Independent economist Saul Eslake, a critic of the 2018 deal, said he was disappointed but not surprised by the prime minister’s decision.<\/p>\n
“Since becoming prime minister, Mr Albanese’s approach has essentially been what Western Australia wants, Western Australia gets,” he said.<\/p>\n
“Mr Albanese knows that his initial accession to the prime ministership was delivered by Western Australia.<\/p>\n
“Although he doesn’t need Western Australia’s votes in the current parliament, it’s likely that he will need them to retain government at the election that’s due in 2028.”<\/p>\n
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WA politician Andrew Hastie has welcomed the announcement.\u00a0 (ABC News: Matt Roberts)<\/p>\n
Federal Liberal frontbencher Andrew Hastie, who represents a Western Australian seat, also welcomed Mr Albanese’s announcement that he would stick by the 2018 deal.<\/p>\n
“We will always stand up for WA, and the Coalition is committed to the current arrangements,” he told ABC’s 7.30.<\/p>\n
“I think the way it [the GST carve-up] was arranged before our change in 2018 was fundamentally unfair.<\/p>\n
“It was punishing productive and prosperous states like Western Australia.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Anthony Albanese is facing further pressure from Labor and Liberal states to overhaul the GST carve-up after declaring…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":79412,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[1869,483,22,21,122046,3139,7436,146,353],"class_list":["post-79411","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-australia","tag-albanese","tag-anthony-albanese","tag-au","tag-austrlia","tag-colin-brooks","tag-funding","tag-gst","tag-roger-cook","tag-western-australia"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/79411","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=79411"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/79411\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/79412"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=79411"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=79411"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=79411"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}