Mining giants BHP and Rio Tinto paid a quarter of all corporate taxes in Australia for the 2021-22 financial year, but more than 800 major companies paid no tax at all, new data has revealed.
The Australian Taxation Office’s Ninth Corporate Tax Transparency Report covered 2,713 corporate entities.
They included 1,496 overseas companies with income of at least $100 million, 590 Australian public entities with income of at least $100 million and 627 Australian resident private companies with income of $200 million or more.
The report found that the amount of taxes collected increased due to rising mining profits and rising oil prices, but 831 companies paid no taxes at all.
Various reasons have been put forward, including companies making an accounting loss or claiming tax compensation which reduced their tax bill to zero.
The ATO noted this data was similar to ASX data, which showed around 20 to 30 per cent of ASX 500 companies reported a net loss to their shareholders.
Qantas, Virgin and Crown Resorts have all said they pay no corporate tax, and have all cited the lingering effects of lockdowns for significant losses.
The Australian Taxation Office revealed that Rio Tinto paid $9.1 billion in tax in the last financial year.
The Commonwealth Bank of Australia paid $3 billion in tax, but the ATO said more than 800 large companies paid no tax.
“Just because an entity does not pay income tax does not necessarily mean it is not meeting its obligations,” ATO Deputy Commissioner Rebecca Saint said.
“Tax is paid on profits and not on gross income. Even entities with significant revenue streams may fail to turn a profit for a variety of reasons.
“There are legitimate reasons why a business may not pay income tax. For example, they may not have made a profit for the year or may be in the start-up phase of their business.
“The Australian community can be assured that we are paying special attention to those who do not pay income tax to ensure they do not try to cheat the system.”
In total, businesses paid a record $83.8 billion in income taxes, up 22 percent from the previous year and almost 50 percent more than it two years ago.
Ms Saint said the tax increase came from the mining sector, reflecting strong commodity prices.
“The 2022 revenue year was the first year that the mining sector paid more taxes than all other sectors combined – something we have not seen in the history of the CTT report,” he said. -she declared.
“In fact, the mining sector paid more tax in 2021-22 than the total tax of all sectors in each of the first three CTT reporting years.”
Since the creation of the Tax Avoidance Task Force in 2016, more than $27.7 billion has been collected in additional tax revenue from multinational companies.
In 2022-23, the ATO said a record $6.4 billion in tax revenue was raised from state-owned and multinational companies.
The ATO said more than 800 major companies, including Qantas (pictured), Virgin and Crown Resorts, paid no corporation tax.
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