Leader of the Opposition Tony Abbot has called the mining tax an election fix saying that the Gillard government lied about reaching the agreement on the mineral resource rent tax (MRRT) to secure an election victory. This was in response to the three mining giants BHP Billiton, Rio Tinto and Xstrata having a meeting this week to consider abandoning the deal.
The mining trio feels that the government is backing away from a key provision of the July 2, 2010 agreement regarding all state royalties being offset by the MRRT. The government says that the deal would be limited to state royalties which were in place or scheduled when the original resource super profits tax was announced in May.
The mining tax seems to be unravelling said the opposition leader speaking in Canberra. Mr Abbot said that plainly this was a government which said one thing before an election to try and win votes and is doing something quite different after the election.
He even accused the government of not telling the truth. He quoted the head of Rio Tinto, Sam Walsh saying that if you can't trust the government who can you trust? And ended with saying that this was the problem with the Gillard government, you couldn't trust it.