Government Finance Statistics, Australia

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Statistics about finances of the general government and public non-financial corporations sectors for the various levels of government in Australia

Reference period

March 2022

Released

31/05/2022

View all releases

Key statistics

In the March quarter 2022:

taxation revenue fell 5.7% to $168.4b
general government net operating balance rose $3.2b to -$2.2b
general government borrowing was $13.6b
total public demand is expected to contribute 0.7ppt to the quarterly change in GDP

Unless indicated, all figures presented in this publication are current prices, original series.

One article is included in this release:

Insights into Government Finance Statistics, key insights and analysis from March quarter 2022

Government finance statistics fiscal measures

Government finance statistics fiscal measures, original
		Jun Qtr 2021	Sep Qtr 2021	Dec Qtr 2021	Mar Qtr 2022	Dec Qtr 2021 to Mar Qtr 2022
		$m	$m	$m	$m	% change
Taxation revenue
	General government	171,283	143,102	178,627	168,361	–5.7%
Total revenue
	General government	207,096	178,847	211,118	204,381	–3.2%
	Public non-financial corporations	26,197	24,735	23,856	25,118	5.3%
Total expenses
	General government	204,878	223,608	216,467	206,578	-4.6%
	Public non-financial corporations	27,608	25,241	24,699	25,525	3.2%
GFS Net Operating Balance
	General government	2,218	-44,761	-5,349	-2,197	np
	Public non-financial corporations	-1,411	-506	-843	-407	np
GFS Net Lending (+)/Borrowing (-)
	General government	-15,403	-52,063	-16,053	-13,593	np
	Public non-financial corporations	-4,754	-2,131	-3,644	-1,967	np

np indicates this value not available for publication but included in totals where applicable, unless otherwise indicated

Net operating balance of all levels of general government (a)
	Revenue ($b)	Expenses ($b)	Net Operating Balance ($b)
Mar-21	177.5	-197.9	-20.4
Jun-21	207.1	-204.9	2.2
Sep-21	178.8	-223.6	-44.8
Dec-21	211.1	-216.5	-5.3
Mar-22	204.4	-206.6	-2.2

Net operating balance of all levels of general government (a)

["","Revenue","Expenses","Net Operating Balance"]

[["Mar-21","Jun-21","Sep-21","Dec-21","Mar-22"],[[177.5],[207.09999999999999],[178.80000000000001],[211.09999999999999],[204.40000000000001]],[[-197.90000000000001],[-204.90000000000001],[-223.59999999999999],[-216.5],[-206.59999999999999]],[[-20.399999999999999],[2.2000000000000002],[-44.799999999999997],[-5.2999999999999998],[-2.2000000000000002]]]

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original, current prices

National accounts public sector measures

The table below includes the key public sector aggregates for the March quarter 2022 which will be included in the Australian National Accounts: National Income, Expenditure and Product. The key figures shown include Total Public Demand, Government Final Consumption Expenditure for total general government and Gross Fixed Capital Formation for total general government and total public corporations, seasonally adjusted in current prices and chain volume terms.

The following are the seasonally adjusted chain volume measures based on the previous quarter:

public sector demand is expected to contribute 0.7 percentage points to the change in GDP in March quarter 2022.
general government final consumption expenditure increased by $3,151m or 2.7% and is expected to contribute 0.6 percentage points to the change in GDP in March quarter 2022.
general government gross fixed capital formation increased by $524m or 2.4%.
public corporations gross fixed capital formation decreased by -$58m or -1.0%.
total public gross fixed capital formation increased by $466m or 1.7% and is expected to contribute 0.1 percentage points to the change in GDP in March quarter 2022.

Quarterly national accounts public sector measures, seasonally adjusted
			Jun Qtr 2021	Sep Qtr 2021	Dec Qtr 2021	Mar Qtr 2022	Dec Qtr 2021 to Mar Qtr 2022
			$m	$m	$m	$m	% change
CURRENT PRICES
General government final consumption expenditure (a)
	National-defence		9,432	9,816	9,475	10,098	6.6
	National-non-defence		41,141	42,526	42,810	44,388	3.7
	Total national		50,573	52,342	52,285	54,485	4.2
	State and local		62,181	65,164	66,404	67,827	2.1
	Total general government final consumption expenditure		112,754	117,506	118,689	122,313	3.1
Public gross fixed capital formation
	General government
		National-defence	2,499	2,916	2,412	2,825	17.1
		National-non-defence	2,182	2,737	2,661	2,699	1.4
		Total national	4,681	5,653	5,072	5,524	8.9
		State and local	17,968	16,650	17,143	17,640	2.9
		Total general government	22,649	22,303	22,215	23,164	4.3
	Public corporations
		Commonwealth	1,618	1,421	1,509	1,421	-5.9
		State and local	4,310	4,431	4,466	4,608	3.2
		Total public corporations	5,928	5,851	5,975	6,029	0.9
	Total public gross fixed capital formation		28,577	28,154	28,190	29,193	3.6
Total public demand			141,331	145,660	146,880	151,505	3.1
Memorandum item
	Net purchases of second hand assets by public sector		1,220	481	529	564	np

CHAIN VOLUME (b)
General government final consumption expenditure
	National-defence		9,395	9,680	9,255	9,772	5.6
	National-non-defence		40,248	41,379	41,457	43,177	4.2
	Total national		49,643	51,059	50,712	52,950	4.4
	State and local		61,240	63,662	64,451	65,365	1.4
	Total general government final consumption expenditure		110,883	114,720	115,163	118,314	2.7
Public gross fixed capital formation
	General government
		National-defence	2,776	3,205	2,525	2,869	13.6
		National-non-defence	2,194	2,725	2,617	2,632	0.6
		Total national	4,970	5,929	5,142	5,501	7.0
		State and local	18,025	16,542	16,751	16,916	1.0
		Total general government	22,995	22,471	21,893	22,417	2.4
	Public corporations
		Commonwealth	1,572	1,368	1,447	1,339	-7.4
		State and local	4,192	4,246	4,240	4,290	1.2
		Total public corporations	5,764	5,614	5,687	5,629	-1.0
	Total public gross fixed capital formation		28,760	28,085	27,580	28,046	1.7
Total public demand			139,642	142,805	142,743	146,360	2.5
Memorandum item
	Net purchases of second hand assets by public sector		1,198	467	504	528	np

— nil or rounded to zero
np indicates this value not available for publication but included in totals where applicable, unless otherwise indicated
(a) See Explanatory Notes for the relationship between general government final consumption expenditure and GFS aggregates
(b) Reference year for chain volume measures in 2019-20 = 100.0

Public expenditure contribution to GDP growth

Public expenditure, contribution to GDP growth (a) (b)
	Government final consumption expenditure (ppt)	Government gross fixed capital formation (ppt)
Mar-19	0.2	0.0
Jun-19	0.6	0.1
Sep-19	0.2	0.0
Dec-19	0.3	0.0
Mar-20	0.3	0.0
Jun-20	0.5	-0.1
Sep-20	0.4	0.0
Dec-20	0.2	0.2
Mar-21	0.0	0.0
Jun-21	0.3	0.4
Sep-21	0.7	-0.1
Dec-21	0.1	-0.1
Mar-22	0.6	0.1

Public expenditure, contribution to GDP growth (a) (b)

["","Government final consumption expenditure","Government gross fixed capital formation"]

[["Mar-19","Jun-19","Sep-19","Dec-19","Mar-20","Jun-20","Sep-20","Dec-20","Mar-21","Jun-21","Sep-21","Dec-21","Mar-22"],[[0.20000000000000001],[0.59999999999999998],[0.20000000000000001],[0.29999999999999999],[0.29999999999999999],[0.5],[0.40000000000000002],[0.20000000000000001],[0],[0.29999999999999999],[0.69999999999999996],[0.10000000000000001],[0.59999999999999998]],[[0],[0.10000000000000001],[0],[0],[0],[-0.10000000000000001],[0],[0.20000000000000001],[0],[0.40000000000000002],[-0.10000000000000001],[-0.10000000000000001],[0.10000000000000001]]]

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Chain volume measures seasonally adjusted
using the GDP series as published in the Dec 2021 release of Australian National Accounts: National Income, Expenditure and Product

Revisions and changes

Accounting standard changes

From 1 July 2019, government financial reporting implemented the following Australian Accounting Standards Board (AASB) standard changes:

Leases (AASB 16)
Revenue recognition (AASB 15 & 1058)
Service Concession Arrangements (AASB 1059)

GFS outputs are consistent with the historical treatments, which has resulted in increased divergences between economic statistics publications and government financial reporting.

Revisions

Statistical revisions are carried out regularly in Government Finance Statistics to reflect the most current information and data available.

Upcoming non-government school education revision

The ABS has reclassified payments to non-government schools in the 2020-21 annual GFS publication. This reclassification will be applied in quarterly GFS and the National Accounts from September quarter 2022. This will result in a reclassification of these payments to benefits to households in goods and services in GFS and National Accounts. Commonwealth and state government financial reporting will continue to separately recognise their funding contributions to non-government schools.

For more information refer to 2020-21 GFS annual revisions and changes.

Divergences with government fiscal reporting

Divergences between state and commonwealth government financial reporting and GFS may occur because of conceptual determinations and timing recognition differences, to ensure alignment with economic activity as measured across ABS macroeconomic statistics.

These differences primarily impact:

measures of government subsidies and other support payments to businesses and households
non-employee expenses
change in inventories

Coronavirus (COVID-19)

COVID-19 impacted a range of Government Finance Statistics series over the preceding two years. As new government policies were announced, the key policies and conceptual determinations were discussed in articles such as Economic measurement during COVID-19: Selected issues in the Economic Accounts, with a quarterly update series, such as Classifying COVID-19 policy interventions during September quarter 2021 in macroeconomic statistics.

Given that the volume of new policies since September quarter 2021 has slowed, this article has been discontinued. The ABS continues to work with GFS data providers on all relevant policy and conceptual determinations.

Previous catalogue number

This release previously used catalogue number 5519.0.55.001.

Data downloads