QUEENSLAND small businesses are being slugged $7 billion in taxes, fees and other charges annually with the cost of State Government red tape increasing more than 30 per cent over the past five years.

Struggling family businesses have labelled Queensland the "nanny state" as they are forced to plough through more than 90,000 pages of regulation governing the sector.

A large slice of operators blame burgeoning paperwork and the extra cost of taxes and levies for halting growth and investment.


Major problems identified by business owners include mountains of paperwork for mandatory permits and licences, complicated calculation methods, an array of audits by bodies such as WorkCover and payroll tax officials, and now growing fear over what new costs next year's carbon tax would deliver locally, especially to electricity charges.



Among those struggling to stay abreast of compliance costs are transport operators, who are subject to 14 pieces of legislation just to stay in business.

One manufacturer said the costs of compliance were becoming so heavy, he took operations to China.

A Chamber of Commerce and Industry Queensland report into the growing cost of government imposts found 93 per cent of businesses believe Queensland had become a "nanny state", and 70 per cent of operators were prevented from investing in growth because of regulation.

The Blueprint for Fighting Over-Regulation report, provided to The Courier-Mail, found that in the most recent financial year, the State Government had increased the cost of red tape by 6.6 per cent, with the overall burden growing 31.6 per cent since a Productivity Commission Report in 2007.

Federal and local taxes made that equation even worse. In its 2011 National CEO Survey, the Australian Industry Group found that Queensland businesses faced the largest direct cost of compliance, averaging 6.5 per cent of total expenses. Businesses in Queensland and New South Wales faced more duplication in information they provided to different regulatory authorities, a greater level of unnecessary regulation and spent more on outsourcing costs, fees and charges.

"During a period when there has been concerted effort to reduce the regulatory burden on business and claims by government of regulatory burden targets being achieved, the compliance costs have increased, not decreased. These costs are expected to further increase in the next three years," the AiGroup survey said.

CCIQ president David Goodwin said Queensland had lost its way and as far as business was concerned, it was "all talk and no action" from the Government on cost reductions.

"We've gone from being the leader to being the cellar dweller from being low cost and low regulation to now being the highest regulated and no longer the lowest cost," he said. "We need the Premier to actually find her voice and stand up for Queensland business," he said.

"If you want to see the whole of the mining resources that we develop in this state be processed offshore, you're going exactly the right way about it. We are missing out on tremendous opportunity. We do need her to find her voice."

"They simply have to find efficiencies. The State Government cannot just get up every day and figure out a new way to charge business just for existing."

Finance Minister Rachel Nolan was quick to point to the Business Council of Australia's 2010 scorecard of Red Tape Reform mid-year, which increased Queensland's score from "adequate but with clear room for improvement" in 2007 to "adequate/good" in 2010.

She pointed to the setting up of Queensland's new Business Commissioner's office which she expected to "be a champion for the business sector and that means its priority must be to cut red tape".

bomen_guy wrote on Nov 8^th, 2011 at 6:03am:




lol you must read a different thread to me...

we are drowning in taxes and bureaucracy and several levels of government..the Fed Govt alone has grown by something like 25%.. someone has got to PAY THEM