The Vanderstock Decision: The Exclusive Power of the Commonwealth to Levy Duties of Excise

The Wigs

In this episode the wigs discuss Vanderstock and Victoria a very fiscally important recent decision of the High Court of Australia. The constitution reserves to the federal government the power to levy excises, essentially taxes on goods. The issue in Vanderstock was whether the Victorian government's electric vehicle levy, charged to owners per km of use was in fact an excise and therefore constitutionally invalid. Victoria said no, the Cth and Vanderstock said yes. In finding the levy invalid the majority departed from decades of case law and potentially fundamentally altered the fiscal balance across the federation.

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