Senator FIFIELD (Victoria—Minister for Communications, Minister for the Arts and Deputy Leader of the Government in the Senate) (14:20): As tempting as it is on occasion to take at face value the assertions that Senator Whish-Wilson makes, I won't because I don't present myself as a resource industry taxation expert. Senator Whish-Wilson did commence his question in relation to tax avoidance by implying that the government had not taken action in this area. Can I remind Senator Whish-Wilson and colleagues that we have taken action by implementing a multinational anti-avoidance law to stop multinationals artificially avoiding a taxable presence in Australia. We have introduced a new diverted profits tax to prevent multinationals shifting profits overseas. We signed the OECD multilateral instrument on 7 June 2017. We've doubled the penalties for multinationals avoiding tax. We've increased the penalties for breaches of tax reporting obligations by multinationals. We've implemented the OECD recommendations for country-by-country reporting to give the ATO greater access to multinational transfer pricing information— The PRESIDENT: Order, Senator Fifield! Senator Whish-Wilson, on a point of order. Senator Whish-Wilson: I acknowledge that there was a little bit of preamble in my question, but the question did directly ask: was the minister aware that these companies had paid no resource rent tax and had clocked up $240 billion in tax credits? The PRESIDENT: I have previously ruled, as have predecessors in this role, that I cannot instruct a minister on how to answer a question. Senator Whish-Wilson, your question did have a preamble. It was slightly more than brief, but entirely within order. The minister is being directly relevant to the question you asked. Senator FIFIELD: Just to complete what I was saying before about the anti-tax avoidance measures the government has taken: we've also aligned Australia's transfer pricing rules with the latest OECD guidelines since July 2016. ATO action has already collected over $1.5 billion from additional liabilities raised against large multinationals. Australia is also continuing its strong international leadership on the G20/OECD Base Erosion and Profit Shifting Project. This government has been extremely active when it comes to ensuring that corporate taxpayers pay what they should. The PRESIDENT: Senator Whish-Wilson, a supplementary question.