Ian Macdonald (Queensland, Liberal Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Northern and Remote Australia) Share this | Hansard source

In the last couple of days there have been floods in Bega on the South Coast and in the Burke Shire in the Gulf of Carpentaria. Minister, will people in these areas be relieved of payment of this tax? As I understand it, a natural disaster relief declaration has to be made by the state governments. If that is done and payments are made to people in those areas by 30 June 2012, they will be exempted from payment. I seek the minister’s confirmation of that.

I also point out that I asked the minister a question that I have asked him several times. The minister did not want to answer it for some reason. Yet, as Senator Cormann pointed out, it can be very easy for the minister to answer. We have wasted 4½ hours in this chamber asking the minister a question, yet one minute before question time he gave some answers. It was pretty easy when it came to it.

I also want an answer from the minister on the number of individual taxpayers who will contribute to this tax. How many individual Australians earning more than $50,000 will pay the tax and how many of that number does the department estimate will be exempted because of the exemptions in the provision before the chamber?