Premier accused of mishandling stadium GST exemption request

Opposition Leader Rebecca White moved the motion on Wednesday, seeking leave to censure the Premier and accusing him of misleading the parliament over the timing of the government's letter seeking GST exemption.

Ms White suggested the government had failed to make the formal request until the afternoon of May 9.

She also noted that the government failed to request a GST exemption for $65 million in funding for the York Park upgrades.

On May 9 in Question Time, Premier Jeremy Rockliff said the government had already sent the request to Federal Treasurer Jim Chalmers.

"When you gave that answer [on May 9], had the formal request been sent, or did you mislead parliament to try to cover up your own incompetence," Ms White asked.

GST exemption for the project could reduce Tasmania's GST relativity - the metric used in calculating how the tax is divvied up between the states - and result in tens of millions of dollars in additional future GST grants that the state would otherwise miss out on.

Labor MHA Dean Winter said: "The only reason that letter was sent was to cover the tracks of the Premier who had misled parliament that morning".

In response, Mr Rockliff said the government had held discussions with Dr Chalmers prior to May 9 regarding GST exemptions for the state.

"The treasurer has had discussions with his counterpart, I've had discussions with the Prime Minister, I absolutely reject your assertion," he said.

Later, Treasurer Michael Ferguson tabled the letter, saying it undermined the case made by Labor and the Greens that the government made the request after question time.

"Very clearly, discussions have been had between the Premier and the Prime Minister well before any issues were raised in this house," Mr Ferguson said.

He read from the letter, which included the line: "further to our recent discussions, I am now formally requesting you to write to the chair of the Commonwealth Grants Commission to request that these payments are excluded from the calculation of GST relativities for the 2024 update".

Cassy O'Connor later asked why it had taken 11 days from the day the federal funding was confirmed to the day the GST exemption request was made.

The date of the letter was revealed on Tuesday during question of Commonwealth Treasury official Damian White by Greens Senator Nick McKim during a hearing of the Senate Economics Committee in Canberra.

Mr White confirmed a letter from Mr Ferguson seeking the exemption had been sent on May 9.

He also confirmed that the letter made no reference to a possible exemption for the $65 million upgrade to York Park.

Greens Leader Cassy O'Connor later questioned why Mr Ferguson had not requested GST exemption for the $65 million York Park upgrade project as well.

Mr Ferguson did not answer that question directly.

He pointed out that Dr Chalmers had still not decided to recommend an exemption to the Tasmanian funding and questioned why Labor's Tasmanian federal parliamentarians were not lobbying more actively in the state's interests.

After question time, Ms White moved to suspend parliamentary standing orders to allow for debate over a censure motion against Mr Rockliff, stating he had misled parliament in his responses to questions about the GST exemption request on May 9.

The motion to suspend standing orders failed after the government, the Greens, and independents Lara Alexander and John Tucker voted against it.

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