Greens leader Christine Milne has used the weekend’s 20th National Summit to once again push for the mining tax to be renegotiated.
Commissioning new costing data, the Greens have revealed that a 40 per cent increase to the Mining Resources Revenue Tax (MRRT) would raise budget revenue projections by $26 billion in revenue over the next four years, the ABC reported.
"At the moment the mining tax is securing zero, it's projected to secure $9 billion, well we could take that out to $26 billion," Milne said.
Kevin Rudd told The Australian the Greens entry to the debate is ‘opportunistic’.
"I seem to remember that we would have had an earlier, more effective solution to critical challenges such as climate change had the Greens, as a matter of principle, stuck to their principles and backed an emissions trading scheme (ETS) back when I was prime minister," Rudd told Sky News yesterday.
The Federal Government has come out in defence of the MRRT, with Prime Minister Julia Gillard rejecting the Green’s advice.
"We have implemented the mining tax that we believe is the right one for the nation," she said.
Australian Mining reported earlier this month that a high Australian dollar, lower commodity prices and falling mining profits means the tax payments the government was banking on will be much lower than the 90 per cent expected, forcing the revenue predictions to be lowered from $3.7 billion to $2 billion for the 2012-12 financial year.