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*Estimated Fuel tax credits paid each year to the 26 companies that would exceed a $50m cap.
Regular Aussies pay fuel tax. A nurse driving to a shift pays fuel tax. A tradie driving between jobs pays fuel tax. Australia's largest mining companies pay it too — and then get nearly all of it back. That refund costs taxpayers billions every year.
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It's called the Fuel Tax Credit Scheme. An estimated $3 billion goes to major mining companies that do not need this extra support.
BHP got $622 million back last year. Rio Tinto $432 million. Glencore $349 million. These are not struggling businesses. They are among the most profitable companies on Earth, and your taxes are buying their fuel.
Australian families don't get refunds for the petrol they use. Big businesses shouldn't get out of paying fuel tax while the rest of us pay.
A mining company replacing its machinery has a choice: diesel, or electric. The Government is using your money to make diesel cheaper. So diesel wins, mining companies don't electrify, and taxpayer money drives up emissions.
Electrifying our mines is one of the biggest emissions cuts this country can make — and one of the biggest barriers is an uncapped tax break that you are paying for.
Big mining companies funnel their profits to foreign investors. Our government should stop spending billions on fuel tax refunds that end up overseas, and instead encourage companies to invest in Australian made energy.
All that money could be put to more productive, valuable use. Australia has the best resources in the world – if we invest in making things here, we'll be selling the world what it needs next, not just what it's running out of.
Paying the country's biggest miners to burn imported diesel makes us more exposed to overseas supply shocks, like the Middle East crisis.
Australia is the largest importer of diesel in the world and mining companies use over a third of it.1 The more they burn, the less there is for other industries like truckies, and the more vulnerable our economy becomes to overseas volatility.
Impacts 26 companies, which collectively made enormous profits last year. Not one farmer, truckie or small business loses a cent, and our tax dollars will stop subsidising some of the world's most profitable companies. In its first three years of operation, PBO modelling shows a $50m cap on the diesel refund would return $4.7 billion to the budget.2
The Fuel Tax Credit Scheme refunds fuel excise to certain kinds of businesses, especially those burning diesel on private roads. It will cost $10.7 billion of public money in 2026-27.3
Over $3 billion flows to a handful of the largest mining companies in the country. That money doesn't build or fix a single thing. It buys diesel, almost all of it imported. We are taxing Australians to pay multinational mining companies.
It ranks 18th in the federal Budget — above the Air Force, above courts, police and border protection combined, and four times what we spend protecting the environment. It is 90% of what the federal government spends on public schools each year.
Estimate based on the current fuel excise rate of 53.7 cents per litre. Excludes GST.
If fuel tax credits were capped at $50 million per company, only 26 large companies, mostly mining companies, would be impacted.5 Here are the top ten.
Figure: Estimated Diesel Consumption and Fuel Tax Credit Receipts, 2025. The ATO does not publish company-level data. Source: Climate Energy Finance calculations.
The mining industry claims that fuel excise is used for road funding, so businesses that don't use public roads should receive fuel tax credits.
But there has been no formal link between fuel tax and road spending since 1992. Fuel excise goes into general revenue. Only the extra revenue from indexation since 2014 goes to roads.6 The roads argument doesn't explain why the largest companies should get unlimited refunds.
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