Four deadlines close today; Budget next week

What a week!

Four submission deadlines close at 5pm today:

1. Joint Committee of Public Accounts and Audit — Inquiry into the management of client privacy in the Australian public sector. If your organisation handles government client data, your submission window closes this afternoon.

2. Joint Committee of Public Accounts and Audit — Inquiry into the administration of the Age Pension. Relevant for aged care, superannuation, and social services stakeholders.

3. Parliamentary Joint Committee on Intelligence and Security — Review of the Anti-Money Laundering and Counter-Terrorism Financing Amendment Bill 2026. The bill sits at the intersection of financial regulation and national security. If you've been tracking it, submit today or wait for the next consultation round.

4. Joint Committee of Public Accounts and Audit — Inquiry into Defence's Procurement of Infantry Fighting Vehicles (Land 400 Phase 3). Defence procurement and industry policy stakeholders will have already prepared for today's deadline; others should see this as a temporal note for when submissions will be made public (likely within the fortnight).

From the report tabled by the Senate Select Committee on the Taxation of Gas Resources: as widely reported by media, the committee could not agree on recommendations. The report instead offers that government revisit this issue after the conflict in/ with Iran is resolved with regard to effects on energy supply, and provided for additional comments from each political party. This can be summarised as:

• The Greens want a 25% flat tax on gas export revenue to replace the Petroleum Resource Rent Tax (PRRT).
• Labor senators want more data before committing to reform, asking for the Treasury or the Productivity Commission to produce a comprehensive report on supporting and accurate data, and run a consultation process with industry, but only after the Middle East energy crisis has passed.
• The Coalition opposes any new tax.

A note on implications for next week: PRRT currently returns less than 2% of export revenue (designed to return ~8%), Santos paid A$33 million in Australian income tax on A$41 billion in sales over the decade to 2025, and INPEX paid zero PRRT on A$81.3 billion of income over the same period. The Government has already ruled out a new gas export tax in the Budget, but Labor's own additional comments in the report invite a Productivity Commission review after the Middle East situation settles — leaving the door open for a post-Budget process.

A wrap on this week's committee activity: Illegal tobacco hearing (Mon), Offshore processing hearing and false trade marks report (Tue), Small business insurance hearing in Sydney and National Emergency Declaration review (Wed), Gas tax report tabled (per above, yesterday).

Parliament sits Monday. Budget is Tuesday night. If you know a colleague who needs Krafted. for Budget week, send them to (statekraft.au).

— Mia