Back at Hawke’s Brewery, a journalist asked the prime minister whether freezing the beer excise tax will make any difference to the average beer drinker. “So we won’t see the schooner price go up for two years?”
Albanese responded with, “If it does, then no one can blame the Government.”
The prime minister also said this tax policy change “has been requested for a long time, by the hoteliers, by clubs, and by small operations like this.” In 2024, Australian brewers and distillers criticized tax increases on their products and urged the government to freeze tax hikes.
The Independent Brewers Association noted that while the biannual tax hikes likely weren’t a problem for large, foreign-owned beer businesses, they hurt smaller brewers. “Every cent that independent brewers spend on excise is money they cannot invest back into their staff, innovation, sustainability, or supporting their communities.”
The spirits industry concurred. “These six-monthly increases are becoming increasingly difficult for our business to sustain, and they are impossible to plan for,” said Craig Michael, Director of the Bellarine gin distillery in Victoria. “How can we accurately undertake financial modelling and make business decisions if we don’t know what tax rate we will be paying in six months’ time?”
Nevertheless, the Australian government hasn't frozen the excise on spirits, and the spirits industry isn’t pleased. “The tax on spirits is already three times higher than it is on beer,” said Greg Holland, Chief Executive of Spirits & Cocktails Australia. He sees no policy justification to support a tax freeze on beer alone.
However, at the end of February, the government announced a different tax relief plan for distillers and wine producers as well as brewers.
