CANBERRA: Australia is to review its tax regime for oil and gas companies amid concerns the government is missing out on its share of profits from a A$200bn (US$150bn) investment boom in the liquefied natural gas sector. The probe was prompted by government figures showing that A$800m of petroleum resource rent taxes (PRRT) — a levy companies pay in return for being allowed to extract resources — were collected in the 2015-16 fiscal year, less than half the A$1.9bn raised a year earlier. Canberra has forecast no recovery in PRRT revenues over the next four years in spite of the country’s LNG exports being forecast to double as new projects enter production.
Australia is set to overtake Qatar as the world’s largest producer of LNG by 2018-19 following a huge investment boom. But there is growing public concern that the tax regime for oil and gas producers is too generous, open to abuse by operators and lacks adequate scrutiny. “This government is committed to ensuring that Australia’s taxes are working as intended and companies pay the right amount,” Scott Morrison, Australia’s treasurer, said on Wednesday.
