Australian Industry Group welcomed the opportunity to provide a submission to the Board of Taxation’s Red Tape Reduction Review 2025.

 

This review of business tax administration is timely and germane. Australia’s current system of business taxation system is inhibiting investment and productivity. Our taxes are too complex, internationally uncompetitive and a barrier to investment and productivity growth

 

We recognise that many of the complexities in Australia’s business taxes arise from tax policy, through the design of individual tax measures and their interactions as a system. However, tax administration plays a key role in mediating tax policy to the experience of business entities. Ensuring that tax administration practices are simple and efficient is critical in ensuring that additional regulatory burden is not introduced.

 

In this submission, we identify three areas where the tax administrative practices of the Australian Taxation Office (ATO) could be improved to reduce complexity and regulatory burden. These include the Research & Development Tax Incentive (RDTI), the GST classification of new food products, and national security exemptions under Public Country-by-Country reporting (P-CbC).

 

Each of these areas provides an opportunity where changes to ATO administrative practice can be made to reduce compliance burden, cost and uncertainty for business.