Can we build a great Australia with taxes that are fair and just?

At lunch that day, a lawyer asked me why I was trying to take bread and butter business away from the legal and accounting professions by simplifying superannuation. He missed the point that most Australians would like to be able to understand how their superannuation fund workds. This won’t stop them from employing a professional to help them if they want to.

While scores of taxation issues were raised at the Summit, you will be bored to tears if I try to comment on them all, so let us just look the question that I posed in my headline.

Can we have a tax system that is fair and just?

Yes, we can. But, there are many vested interests that don’t want it to be that way. They still peddle the outdated and disproven theory that if you give more and more tax breaks to the wealthy, this will cause them to invest heavily and create jobs and general prosperity.

This is known generally as ‘the trickle down effect,’ and it has never produced this result in my lifetime, and never will. The current system just makes the wealthy wealthier and the poor poorer. I am fast coming to the conclusion that a flat tax on revenue with no allowable deductions is the best way to go, but no-one at the Summit appeared to be game to take this on.

Can we build a great Australia as the result of enlightened taxation policies?

Yes. A flat tax system will mean that all avoiders will pay tax, many of them for the first time in their lives. Then, we will need to elect wise and brave governments to ensure that a mandated part of those taxes is invested in the essentials — education, health, housing and infrastructure.

Can we cherish the hope that enlightened changes in tax laws will occur soon?

I reckon that we can!