Franking credit discussion should be ‘dead and buried’, says BGL

“I thought after the election result no government would change the franking credits system. Clearly, the Australian people have spoken, so it surprised me to see comments from a partner of a big four firm suggesting the policy was in need of review,” Mr Lesh said.

“Reading the papers over the past few days, it would seem many from the Left are having problems with the election result, but I would have thought the accounting profession would have been happy this whole sordid matter has now been put to bed.”

Mr Lesh said Australian’s have voted decisively and made it clear they believe the current system is fair.

“If a company pays tax on behalf of a shareholder, the shareholder should be entitled to a credit for the tax paid — whether that leads to the shareholder receiving a cash refund or not,” he said.

“The Labor policy was simply unfair to SMSFs, pensioners and many other hard-working Australians who have invested their after-tax dollars in shares. It was a retiree’s tax and Australia’s retirees rejected it.”

Mr Lesh said he hoped that all of the “discriminatory and unfair tax policies dreamt up by the Labor Party were now well and truly dead and buried”.

“Certainly, any politician dumb enough to bring back any of these policies will face defeat at a general election,” he said.