The best way to stop the massive under-taxation of Australian LNG would be to fix the petroleum resource rent tax, but a quick second best would be a tax on export revenue.

The Australian gas industry is paying ridiculously low rates of tax. The resources that they are mining belong to all of us, not just them, but many Australian offshore gas fields pay no royalties, with approximately 56 per cent of exported gas being royalty-free.

Instead, offshore gas is meant to pay the petroleum resource rent tax, but it is poorly designed. Indeed, as recently as 2023, the Treasury wrote that so far no LNG project had ever paid any PRRT; not even in 2022 when gas prices shot up by four or five times, in response to the cutting-off of Russian gas supplies.

According to the investment advisory firm, Stocks Down Under: “Australia captures less than 30 per cent of profits from its fossil fuel companies, compared to 75-90 per cent in most comparable resource-exporting nations”. Australia Institute research shows that between 2015-16 and 2023-24, the revenue from Australian gas exports has increased more than five times, but Australian government tax revenue from gas exports hardly increased at all.

Furthermore, because of the impact of the Iran War on gas supplies and prices, the profits from gas sales have risen substantially, so we are missing out on even more tax revenue.

In short, the Australian government, which is experiencing considerable budget pressures, should be considering how they might raise additional revenue by increasing the taxation of excessive mining profits or rents.

But instead, the opposition leader, Angus Taylor, claimed at a Parliamentary Enquiry that “a 25 per........

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