@Power_Raid How about we scrap the mining tax and partially nationalise the sector say a 10% stake in all mining companies Australian operations placed in the hands of a Sovereign Wealth Fund that puts most of the profits into building needed infrastructure with the rest reinvested in blue chip Australian stocks to a maximum investment of 10% in any one company.
Sure if you want to kill and industry and ignore the value and risk others have made in terms of exploration. The big issue with this is people seeing taxing the mining industry as a tax on BHP and Rio. Unfortunately, BHP and Rio don't actually
pay the price of a tax rather it is pushed downstream into exploration and prospectors by way of lower acquisition prices. Given the high risk nature of prospectors and exploration, if there isn't high returns no one does it. Without the important activity of exploration, there simply isn't the mines of tomorrow. Australians are so good at this that 46% of the worlds exploration assets are run by Aussies. So we not only kill a local industry but our global competitive advantage because our graduates won't have a place to learn their trade.
You have to remember good title has already been provided with agreed terms and conditions attached. No issue for new titles issued as you suggest thought.
Further, would the sovereign wealth fund contribute to 10% of the exploration and capital going forward?
We would have to change the constitution to allow your suggestion.
A simple royalty basis is far better as it is harder to avoid and ensures we get a tax revenue for every tonne of ore. A corporate tax at 30% (already), a royalty at 8% (slight increase), mining rents at $500k pa for medium size leases (already) and a GST at 10% (already), native title at 2% plus the mining rents would be fair.
Again this would require a change in the constitution as the feds can't tax property of the states.
The bigger issue for me is this tax revenue should be spent on regional development and areas effected by the mining rather than pork barreling our biggest cities. But that is another debate.