An email to 2GB’s Mike Williams
Good morning Mike,
Just a quick thought on this nuttery of putting GST on foreign online purchases…the only way that I can see that the government could implement such a tax is by levying it on everything which is bought overseas and imported, regardless of how it was bought. Otherwise anybody could claim that they ordered the items on the phone or by mail and avoid the tax. As such, the tax would also apply to goods which the retailers are importing, which would increase their costs and they would pass those costs on to us, the customers, which would completely negate the advantage which they are trying to claim through this tax.
The retailers clearly didn’t think this through and are simply trying to be lazy by inventing a “problem” for the government to sort out, rather than putting in the effort to be more competitive and appealing to Australian customers.
Have a great day.
Regards,
Samuel Gordon-Stewart
Canberra