Queensland Premier David Crisafulli has accused the Albanese government of launching a siege on small business following the botched credit card surcharge ban, proposed cuts to worker holiday visas and reforming trust taxes.
The end of the week will mark two years for the LNP state government, tipping it into the second half of its four-year term as it faces recent scrutiny over child safety concerns and its commitment to drastically cut ambulance ramping at hospitals.
While much of Monday’s speech to business leaders at a Centre for Economic Development Australia breakfast was spent on previously covered ground, Crisafulli doubled down on challenging Canberra over an “inbuilt injustice in Queensland”.
Key among his gripes was his view the state receives an unfair cut of the GST pie, echoing a call from Treasurer David Janetzki for a distribution rethink.
“We’ve reached a point in the GST distribution where Western Australia has cut out an amazing deal, and I don’t begrudge that … but the beneficiary has been the states that haven’t been prepared to do the hard yards,” he said.
“Somehow we are viewed as big enough to stand on our own two feet, unlike the west, but small enough that we have to cop all the bad news.
“We’re not getting the upside Victoria and New South Wales get, and we have to call it out.”
Earlier in the speech, Crisafulli had vowed not to use the address as a “pressure relief valve”, but the back end focused heavily on the actions of the federal government.
Besides GST, Crisafulli said the removal of card surcharges at check-out and the Tax Office’s call to disallow credit card payments on tax debt, changes to how trusts were taxed, and potential changes to worker holiday visas, amounted to a siege on small businesses.
“We’ve got to have a discussion about this because it’s so important for the country,” he said.
The premier, a descendant of Italian migrants, also called for a more level-headed approach to the migration debate.
“I just want people to come to the country, sign up to our values, work hard, be proud Aussies – and the country’s better for it,” Crisafulli said.
There was well-worn achievement listing mixed in – critical minerals deals, the data centre energy carve-out and the 80-20 federal-state funding split on the Bruce Highway – but the premier’s key message was Queensland had to stand up for itself and find a middle ground on subjects that starkly divided the left and right sides of politics.
In his typical mild exasperation, Crisafulli insisted his government’s wish to mine fossil fuels while cancelling renewables projects it saw as fanciful was about economics, not ideology.
“I don’t understand how we got to this point in this country where every time we talk about energy it has to be some kind of ideological war, some kind of arm wrestle where people from both camps yell at each other,” he said.
With the Olympics and all the associated infrastructure, if the government could find a middle road, a “golden age” awaited for Queensland, the premier said.
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