Tuesday, 11 August 2026

 David DAVIS (Southern Metropolitan) (00:09): (2674) I want to raise a matter for the Minister for Creative Industries, and my hope is that she takes action by raising this with her federal colleague, specifically the federal minister for creative industries, Mr Burke. There may be forums that she can raise this in, whether they be ministerial forums or taking this up directly. Obviously film production and technical production of that type in Australia is a shared activity between the Commonwealth and the state, with subsidies and support from both levels of government. There are a number of tax matters that have not been dealt with by the Commonwealth government, which are causing serious issues and serious delay. There has been a more than two-year delay to legislate changes to the producer offset scheme that were originally promised in the May 2024 budget to support independent films, and this is now having a significant effect. There are some films that are now leaving Australia because of that, and obviously we want to see as many of these in Victoria as possible.

A recent article by Tim Douglas says:

At the heart of the issue is the government’s unfulfilled commitment to abolish the 20 per cent “above-the-line” cap within the Producer Offset – the refundable tax rebate for productions with significant Australian content’.

New Zealand has recently legislated changes to the comparable arrangements of the international screen production rebate:

… removing the above-the-line salary cap rebate for producers, directors, writers and actors, and allowing for rebates on those high-profile expenses.

To explain this a little further, and I am conscious I have only got a short period of time, the producer offset rebate is based on qualifying Australian production expenditure, or QAPE as it is called.

The current rebate is 40 per cent for eligible feature films, 30 per cent for other eligible formats, and 20 per cent for those formats …

if principal photography began before 2021.

To qualify, a production must meet minimum requirements … The guidelines state that above-the-line expenditure that can be counted for QAPE is capped at 20 per cent of the total film expenditure.

The removal of the Australian ATL cap – widely lauded when it was announced – effectively would allow producers to hire major directors, lead actors and writers without penalty when calculating their total QAPE.

The ATL rebate promise is advertised on the government agency Screen Australia’s website …

under the list of pending changes to the producer offset legislation.

This delay is causing significant damage to the industry, to the sector. The state has got a role but so does the Commonwealth, and the state minister needs to get in and talk to her federal colleague and make sure that he responds and fixes this longstanding delay that is hurting Australian film and television production.