Tax disclosure laws require the Australian Taxation Office to publish the tax details of Australia's wealthiest private companies with revenue of $200 million or more. The 321 companies included on the list had a combined turnover of $145 billion in 2013-14. Of these, 223 reported profits and paid a combined $2 billion in tax List of tax paid by private companies run by Australia's richest revealed
Private companies restructure to avoid being named on ATO's tax disclosure list
The first thing to note about today's data dump from the Australian Taxation Office is the agility and innovation of Australia's wealthiest private companies when it comes to paying tax. Or not. They managed to pay $2 billion net tax on total income of $145 billion in 2013-2014 – what might be reasonably characterised as a skerrick.
What a time to be alive ATO's private company list kicks up more questions about artistry of tax arrangements
Meanwhile, the largest institutions in the world remain well outside the disclosure net. Ironically, the big four global audit firms – PwC, E&Y, KPMG and Deloitte – don't have to publish accounts. Yet they advise multinationals on minimising tax while simultaneously advising governments on tax policy.
Illustration: Rocco Fazzari.
The latest instalment of corporate tax transparency figures show almost a third of large private companies paid no tax in 2013–14.Privately owned companies earning more than $200 million in revenue were captured under the tax transparency measure, which picked up 321 firms.
The Australian Taxation Office (ATO) said 98 of those firms did not pay tax in 2013–14.
The biggest revenue earner not to pay tax was West Australian grain handling cooperative CBH, which paid no company tax in 2013-14 on more than $3.4 billion in revenue.
Among the other largest private companies that paid no tax in 2013–14 were:
- Pratt Consolidated Holdings, despite more than $2.5 billion in revenue;
- Thorney Investments, run by Richard Pratt's son-in-law Alex Waislitz, which earned $430 million in revenue;
- McDonald's Asia-Pacific Consortium, the global supplier of the fast food outlet's beef, which had $478 million in revenue;
- Hoyts, which had $417 million in gross earnings.
- ... Shadow Treasurer Chris Bowen told reporters the data was only made available due to Labor's multinational tax policy proposal, issued last year.
Mr Bowen said that the Coalition and the Greens joined forced last year to pass watered down tax transparency legislation.
"What we need to see is all companies operating in Australia paying their fair share of tax, which is the reason Labor has led this debate," he added.