Senior ATO officials, including Commissioner of Taxation Chris Jordan, have given evidence to the inquiry. It has heard that completely transferable tax credits mean oil and gas companies won’t pay tax for many years.
Mick Tsikas/AAP
The Senate Inquiry into Corporate Tax Avoidance has heard stunning evidence about the failure of the tax and royalties system to capture any of the billions being generated by new projects.
The Australian Tax Office is starting to see the fruits of the pressure flowing from the Senate inquiry into tax avoidance.
Lukas Coch/AAP
The changes required of a textbook that referred to a bakery – an “inappropriate” form of Japanese culture – illustrate how the system falls short of its goals of deliberative and critical education.
As public angst over the prospective A$1 billion subsidy to coal magnate Guatam Adani hits fever pitch, a small company is modestly beavering away on another – more worthy – energy project in Far North…
Turkey may soon become one of the few countries in the history of democracy to vote for the death of democracy.
Steve Evans/flickr
If the ‘yes’ vote prevails in this month’s constitutional referendum, the Turkish people may be in the rare position of democratically approving the death of their own democracy.
Businesses lower down in the supply chain are waiting months for payment, but Coles has moved to pay 1,000 suppliers within 14 days.
Julian Smith/AAP
Putting a stop to powerful corporations exploiting their powerless suppliers would not only deliver small-business votes but would speed up the entire economy.
The Indian people felt a moral obligation to queue up and co-operate with the ‘notes ban’ policy.
Monito/flickr
Public co-operation is not proof of trust in government. The Indian people did not trust elected politicians to represent them against top-down policymaking that caused enormous difficulties.
Will the profits of a privatised NSW Land and Property Information Office end up in a tax haven?
NSW LPI
So on the nose is the proposal to auction off the NSW Land and Property Information Office via a 30-year lease that the Law Society, the Real Estate Institute and the Institute of Surveyors oppose it.
A global cartel has manufactured a ‘gas crisis’ in Australia.
Lennart Tange/fllickr
Over-cooked forecasts for demand have justified excessive spending and higher prices. This is precisely what the gas cartel wants: the spectre of shortages whipping up prices.
Could a randomly selected tree make a better president than Donald Trump?
Bruce Irschick/flickr
If people are starting to look much worse in democratic terms, trees are starting to look much better. We are learning that plants engage in meaningful and, more to the point, truthful communication.
It seems even Macquarie’s own ex-bankers feel the sting of an ‘investment advice’ fees trail.
Joel Carrett/AAP
For those who might wish to check if they are being swatted unwittingly with undisclosed or barely disclosed fees on their investments, there appears to be one solid approach to take: ring up and ask.
It’s quite a feat to sell beer to a nation of drinkers like Australia and not record a taxable income.
Bala Sivakumar/flickr
Confounding the familiar government narrative of reckless spending binges by Labor, the Coalition actually has the record of greater profligacy when it comes to showering billions of dollars of taxpayers…
We live in darkening times, so it’s time for some dark humour. Inspired by the antics of a Big Man with a Big Mouth, think just for a moment about the important subject of how democracies treat their elected…
Donald Trump’s reinvention of the royal fiat as rule-by-tweet, or ‘twiat’, is anti-democratic and needs to be resisted.
Twitter
Nick Couldry, London School of Economics and Political Science
Donald Trump is reinventing the royal fiat by novel means: the rule-by-tweet, or ‘twiat’. This move is not an extension of popular democracy, but its enemy, and it needs to be resisted.
Just say no! Tyranny depends on mass subservience.
Alek S./flickr
The origin of tyrannical power is irrelevant: whether by election, inheritance or force, if rulership is oppressive, it is tyrannical. And the way to beat it is deceptively simple: refuse to comply.
Can Europe prove that it’s capable of finding energy in its contradictions and differences and reinvent itself as a place the whole world respects?
William Murphy/flickr
According to German public intellectual Claus Offe, Europe faces multiple crises but is not down and out yet.
By engaging a broad base of people on a popular level, film has a much more immediate and visceral impact than formal lustration proceedings.
Before the Rain (1994)
Cinema can be instrumental in opening up dialogue on collective culpability for the past. Manchevski’s Before the Rain and Angelopoulos’ Ulysses’ Gaze are perfect examples of this.
Graffiti on a wall in Sana'a, Yemen, denounces US drone strikes that have killed scores of civilians.
Khaled Abdullah/Reuters
The ancient Greek historian Herodotus once observed that Persian rulers indulged the habit of getting drunk when making important decisions. When sober and sensible next morning, their custom was to reconsider…
Podemos must reconsider who is above and who is below – who are the people and who are the people’s enemy.
Podemos Uviéu/flickr
Podemos positioned itself as leading a revolt by the people against the political system. Now, as Spain’s third-largest party, it is part of that system and has some difficult decisions to make.
Professor of Comparative Political Science and Democracy Research at the Humboldt University Berlin; Associate of the Sydney Democracy Network, University of Sydney; Director of Research Unit Democracy: Structures, Performance, Challenges, WZB Berlin Social Science Center.