Assistant Treasurer Helen Coonan continued to push the state tax issue in the Senate last week, highlighting the link between underinsurance and taxation on insurance.

Asked specifically what the response of the insurance industry was to the victims of the recent bushfires, Senator Coonan called on state and territory governments to address the “real problem” of underinsurance by reviewing their world record premium taxes.

“The bottom line is that the cost of insurance in Australia is massively inflated by taxation, particularly state and territory taxation,” she said.

Referring to the Insurance Council of Australia’s survey on underinsurance, she said it is a sad reality that many Australian are uninsured, a fact brought home by the recent bushfires in Canberra, Victoria and New South Wales.