Inquiry Targeting Green Groups Accidentally Exposes $145 Million Mining Tax Dodge

Greg Hunt - parliamentary inquiry mining
industry tax lobbying loophole.

The Australia Institute has revealed that the mining industry enjoys a bigger tax break on its lobbying activities than the environmental organisations forced under the microscope of a parliamentary inquiry.

Lobbying organisations like the New South Wales Minerals Council kicked up a stink earlier this year, complaining that environmental groups have been engaging in ‘political’ lobbying at the same time as enjoying a tax-deductible status on donations.

The Chief Executive Officer of the NSW mining lobby, Stephen Galilee, argues “the fact that these groups can ask the public for money, promoting donations as being ‘tax deductible’ is an outrageous abuse of taxpayer dollars”.

“These protest organisations should not receive special tax treatment,” Galilee said in February.

By March, the Federal Environment Minister, Greg Hunt, had established a lower house inquiry into the tax-free status of donations made to green groups listed on the Register of Environmental Organisations.

Read the New Matilda story - “Inquiry Targeting Green Groups Accidentally Exposes $145 Million Mining Tax Dodge.”