Australian Government Rules Out Possibility Of Inheritance Tax

by Mary Swire, Tax-News.com, Hong Kong

21 November 2002

Australian Finance Minister, Nick Minchin this week denied that the coalition government is considering introducing an inheritance tax.

According to an AAP report, Labor's superannuation spokesman, Nick Sherry accused the government of planning to replace the now defunct death duties with IHT, citing a heavily censored consultant's report obtained under the freedom of information act as evidence of this.

However, Senator Minchin strongly denied that the document - of which reportedly all but 3 of the 32 pages were blacked out - accurately represented the government's plans for the future:

'It's an internal working document which has no status,' he explained to the Senate Finance Committee, adding that: 'I cannot conceive of any circumstances where a Liberal government would ever reintroduce death duties.'

However, the AAP reported that Senator Sherry expressed scepticism at this guarantee, comparing it to Prime Minister John Howard's pledge never to introduce a GST.

'You don't want to let the Australian public know what your agenda is,' he accused.

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