{"id":"C2004A00462","name":"A New Tax System (Goods and Services Tax Imposition—General) Act 1999","slug":"a-new-tax-system-goods-and-services-tax-imposition-general-act-1999","collection":"act","jurisdiction":"commonwealth","status":"in_force","isInForce":true,"actNumber":"75 of 1999","makingDate":null,"administeringDepartment":null,"currentVersion":{"id":38510,"registerId":"commonwealth-C2004A00462-1775056120323","compilationNumber":null,"startDate":"2026-04-01","status":"InForce","reasons":null,"registeredAt":null},"sections":[{"sectionNumber":"1","sectionType":"section","heading":"Short title [see Note 1]","content":"#### 1 Short title \\[see Note 1\\]\n\n  This Act may be cited as the A New Tax System (Goods and Services Tax Imposition—General) Act 1999.","sortOrder":0},{"sectionNumber":"2","sectionType":"section","heading":"Commencement","content":"#### 2 Commencement\n\n  This Act commences on 1 July 2000.","sortOrder":1},{"sectionNumber":"3","sectionType":"section","heading":"Imposition","content":"#### 3 Imposition\n\n  (1) The tax that is payable under the GST law (within the meaning of the A New Tax System (Goods and Services Tax) Act 1999) is imposed by this section under the name of goods and services tax (GST).\n  (2) This section imposes GST only so far as that tax:\n    (a) is neither a duty of customs nor a duty of excise within the meaning of section 55 of the Constitution; and\n    (b) is not imposed by the A New Tax System (Goods and Services Tax Imposition (Recipients)—General) Act 2005.","sortOrder":2},{"sectionNumber":"4","sectionType":"section","heading":"Rate","content":"#### 4 Rate\n\n  The rate of goods and services tax payable under the A New Tax System (Goods and Services Tax) Act 1999 is 10%.","sortOrder":3},{"sectionNumber":"5","sectionType":"section","heading":"Act does not impose a tax on property of a State","content":"#### 5 Act does not impose a tax on property of a State\n\n  (1) This Act does not impose a tax on property of any kind belonging to a State.\n  (2) Property of any kind belonging to a State has the same meaning as in section 114 of the Constitution.","sortOrder":4}],"analysis":{"summary":{"complexity_score":3,"scope_assessment":{"changed":false,"description":"The Act remains focused on its original and singular purpose: formally imposing GST at the constitutional level and setting the rate at 10%. No scope creep or departure from original intent is evident."},"complexity_factors":["Requires understanding of the constitutional distinction between customs duties, excise duties, and general taxation under sections 55 and 114 of the Constitution","Functions as a companion piece to multiple other Acts, meaning its full significance is only understood in legislative context","The concept of 'imposition' as a constitutional requirement (versus the mechanics of the tax defined elsewhere) is a subtle but important legal distinction","Reference to a separate 'Recipients' imposition Act adds a layer of complexity around who bears the tax obligation in certain scenarios"],"plain_english_summary":"## What This Law Does\n\nThis Act is one of the foundational pieces of legislation that **legally establishes the Goods and Services Tax (GST)** in Australia — the 10% tax added to the price of most goods and services you buy.\n\n## Who It Affects\n\nPractically **every Australian** — consumers, businesses, and government entities — since GST applies to most commercial transactions in the country.\n\n## Key Points in Plain English\n\n- **It officially creates GST**: Without this Act, the government wouldn't have the legal authority to collect the tax. Australia's Constitution requires taxes to be formally imposed by an Act of Parliament.\n- **The rate is locked in at 10%**: This Act sets the GST rate at 10%, which is why changing the GST rate requires an Act of Parliament — it can't just be done by regulation or government decision alone.\n- **It has boundaries**: The Act is carefully worded to avoid stepping on other constitutional (the foundational law of Australia) provisions about customs duties (taxes on imports) and excise duties (taxes on domestically produced goods like fuel and alcohol) — those are handled under separate laws.\n- **States are protected**: The Act cannot impose GST on property owned by State governments. This reflects a constitutional rule (section 114) that prevents the Commonwealth from taxing State property.\n- **It started on 1 July 2000**: This is when GST came into effect in Australia.\n\n## Why It Matters\n\nThis is essentially the **'switch' that turns GST on**. The companion Act (*A New Tax System (Goods and Services Tax) Act 1999*) contains all the detailed rules about how GST works — but without this short Act formally *imposing* the tax, none of those rules would result in an actual legal obligation to pay."},"issue_detection":{"absurdities":[{"type":"circular_definition","section":"3(1)","severity":"medium","reasoning":"Section 3(1) imposes GST on tax that is 'payable under the GST law'. Liability to pay GST under the GST Act depends on GST being validly imposed. This Act is the instrument of imposition. The section therefore imposes a tax on something that only becomes payable upon imposition — the condition precedent and the operative act are the same event. While courts have read these companion statutes harmoniously, the logical structure is genuinely circular: you cannot have tax 'payable' before it is 'imposed', yet the imposition is triggered by it being 'payable'.","confidence":0.62,"description":"Circular imposition: the section imposes a tax that is 'payable under the GST law' — but the tax is only payable because it is imposed. The imposition presupposes an obligation that does not exist until the imposition occurs, creating a bootstrapping circularity."},{"type":"retroactive_impossibility","section":"3(2)(b)","severity":"low","reasoning":"Section 3(2)(b) carves out liability imposed by a 2005 Act. This carve-out was inserted by amendment after 2005. As originally enacted and as commenced on 1 July 2000, this exclusion referenced a non-existent instrument, meaning that between commencement and the 2005 amendment, the carve-out was either superfluous or produced an uncertain scope of imposition. While this is a known and accepted legislative drafting technique (anticipatory or subsequently inserted exclusions), the logical result is that the Act as it stood on commencement purported to exclude a law that did not yet exist, which is a temporal oddity if not a strict impossibility.","confidence":0.55,"description":"The exclusion of tax imposed by the A New Tax System (Goods and Services Tax Imposition (Recipients)—General) Act 2005 creates a temporal absurdity: a 1999 Act excludes operation of a 2005 Act that did not exist when the 1999 Act was enacted or when it commenced (1 July 2000)."},{"type":"other","section":"4","severity":"low","reasoning":"Under the constitutional framework, imposition and rate may be dealt with together. However, the GST Act 1999 itself contains provisions about rate and the relationship of supply to tax liability. Having the rate appear in this imposition Act without a clear supremacy provision as between the two Acts could theoretically produce uncertainty if the Acts were ever amended inconsistently. The confidence is low because in practice the Acts are read together, but the structural redundancy is a latent flaw.","confidence":0.38,"description":"Section 4 sets the rate of GST payable under the GST Act, but this Act's constitutional role is imposition, not rate-setting. The rate is prescribed in a separate imposition Act yet the primary GST Act also references rate. This creates an ambiguity as to which instrument is the authoritative source of the rate obligation."},{"type":"circular_definition","section":"5(1) and 5(2)","severity":"low","reasoning":"Section 114 of the Constitution prohibits the Commonwealth from imposing 'any tax on property of any kind belonging to a State'. It does not define the phrase; its meaning has been developed through case law (e.g. distinguishing proprietary interests from regulatory burdens). By saying the phrase has 'the same meaning as in section 114', the Act imports extensive constitutional uncertainty directly into a statute that is supposed to provide clear operative rules. This is not strictly circular but it is an illusory definition — the Act appears to define a term while actually leaving it entirely undefined and litigable.","confidence":0.72,"description":"Section 5(2) defines 'property of any kind belonging to a State' by reference to section 114 of the Constitution, but section 114 of the Constitution does not itself define that phrase — it uses it as a prohibition. The definition therefore points to an undefined constitutional term and defers interpretive uncertainty rather than resolving it."}],"contradictions":[{"severity":"low","section_a":"3(2)(a)","section_b":"3(1)","confidence":0.58,"description":"Section 3(1) imposes GST broadly on all tax payable under the GST law, while section 3(2)(a) withdraws imposition for anything constituting a duty of customs or excise under s55 of the Constitution. This means the Act affirmatively imposes a tax in subsection (1) and then partially un-imposes it in subsection (2), leaving a gap: if a transaction is both caught by the GST law and constitutes a duty of excise, it is simultaneously 'imposed' and 'not imposed' by the same section, with the resolution depending entirely on external constitutional classification."},{"severity":"medium","section_a":"2","section_b":"3(2)(b)","confidence":0.61,"description":"The Act commences 1 July 2000 (section 2) but section 3(2)(b) excludes operation of an Act from 2005. On commencement, section 3(2)(b) either had no legal referent (the 2005 Act being nonexistent) meaning the exclusion was inoperative and the scope of imposition was correspondingly broader, or the provision was void for uncertainty — directly contradicting the intended comprehensive but bounded imposition in section 3(1) read with 3(2)."}]},"kimi_summary":{"content_quality":"ok","complexity_score":2,"scope_assessment":{"changed":false,"description":"This Act has remained tightly focused on its original purpose since 1999: constitutionally imposing the GST at 10% while excluding customs/excise duties and State property. The only substantive amendment was the addition of section 3(2)(b) in 2005 to exclude reverse-charge GST, but this was a technical adjustment to work with a companion Act rather than scope creep. The Act remains a narrow constitutional instrument."},"complexity_factors":["Extremely short: only 5 sections total","No defined terms section - relies entirely on definitions from the main GST Act via cross-reference","Minimal conditional logic: only two exclusion clauses in section 3(2) and the State property exemption in section 5","Heavy reliance on external references: 'GST law', 'A New Tax System (Goods and Services Tax) Act 1999', 'section 55 of the Constitution', 'section 114 of the Constitution', and the 2005 Recipients Imposition Act","Constitutional drafting: section 3(2)(a) is specifically designed to navigate section 55 of the Constitution (which requires customs and excise duties to originate in the House of Representatives and be uniform)","No exceptions to exceptions or nested structures"],"plain_english_summary":"This is one of the laws that creates Australia's Goods and Services Tax (GST). It does three main things:\n\n**1. It officially creates the tax**\nSection 3 imposes (legally establishes) the GST, but only the parts that aren't customs duties, excise duties, or reverse-charge GST (where the recipient pays instead of the supplier). This is a constitutional safety net to make sure the tax is valid.\n\n**2. It sets the rate at 10%**\nSection 4 fixes the GST rate at 10% of the price of taxable goods and services.\n\n**3. It protects State property**\nSection 5 ensures the tax doesn't apply to property owned by State governments, following a constitutional rule (section 114 of the Constitution) that says the Commonwealth can't tax State property.\n\n**Why this matters:**\nThis Act is the 'imposition' half of the GST system. For a tax to be constitutionally valid in Australia, Parliament must pass separate laws to *impose* the tax and to *assess/collect* it. This is the imposition Act. It works alongside the main GST Act (which contains all the rules about what is taxed, who pays, and exemptions) and the GST Administration Act (which covers collection and enforcement). Without this short Act, the GST wouldn't legally exist."}},"importantCases":[],"_links":{"self":"/api/acts/a-new-tax-system-goods-and-services-tax-imposition-general-act-1999","history":"/api/acts/a-new-tax-system-goods-and-services-tax-imposition-general-act-1999/history","analysis":"/api/acts/a-new-tax-system-goods-and-services-tax-imposition-general-act-1999/analysis","conflicts":"/api/acts/a-new-tax-system-goods-and-services-tax-imposition-general-act-1999/conflicts","importantCases":"/api/acts/a-new-tax-system-goods-and-services-tax-imposition-general-act-1999/important-cases","documents":"/api/acts/a-new-tax-system-goods-and-services-tax-imposition-general-act-1999/documents"}}