Summary of 2017 Federal Budget

This year's Federal budget handed down by Treasurer, Scott Morrison, was, to a large extent, a political budget. Haunted by budgets past, including proposed legislation being blocked by a hostile Senate, the Treasurer handed down a budget that corrects Australia's course towards a return to a budget surplus, while at the same time providing the maximum chance of having the changes passed in the Senate.

From a tax perspective there was virtually no tax reform contained in the budget; but rather a series of tweaks and fairly minor structural changes, some of which, as seen below, may have major practical implications (rather than raising significant further revenue). Some of the more important measures that caught our eye were as follows.