The Australian Manufacturing Workers' Union has put out a 32-page manifesto calling for sweeping tax reform — a new top marginal rate, an annual wealth tax, and an inheritance tax on large bequests — just ahead of the Labor Party's national conference in Adelaide this week.

The document, published as a PDF titled "Our union blueprint for action" on the AMWU's official communications platform, describes itself as a "working-class agenda" and explicitly rejects the framing of a polite policy submission. The union calls it "a working-class instruction to the government on how to build a society that actually works for us all" (The Guardian).

The manifesto's central claim is that Australia's taxation system is "rigged in favour of private wealth accumulation and speculation." The proposals flow from that diagnosis. The AMWU wants a new marginal tax rate applied to income above $500,000. Under the current schedule, the highest marginal rate is 47% (including the 2% Medicare levy) and kicks in at $190,000. The document also calls for an annual wealth tax on assets excluding the family home, and an inheritance tax on large bequests to prevent what the union calls the "intergenerational concentration" of wealth.

On the revenue side, the manifesto demands "fundamental reform" to the petroleum resource rent tax (PRRT) to extract more revenue from gas companies. The PRRT is a tax on profits from offshore petroleum projects; the union wants it tightened. The AMWU also states it has long opposed free trade agreements, describing them as "anything but free for the working class," while opposing blanket flat tariffs, which it characterises as "a tax on working people" (AMWU, "Our union blueprint for action").

The spending proposals are expansive. The manifesto proposes using extra tax revenue to raise the JobSeeker rate, make education including university free, and nationalise aged care. None of this has been costed. The document goes well beyond anything the Albanese government would realistically consider adopting (The Guardian).

The timing is deliberate. The Labor national conference runs Thursday to Saturday in Adelaide. The AMWU is described as one of the loudest progressive voices in the labour movement and has form on this terrain: it advocated for winding back property investor tax concessions before the Albanese government pursued the policy itself.

The gas tax is the one area where the union's agenda intersects with live conference business. Labor is set to make an in-principle commitment to a gas tax at the conference, with the draft platform binding the party to ensure a "fairer return" on natural resources. But the parliamentary party is not required to implement it, and Prime Minister Albanese is not considering a gas tax due to uncertainty stemming from the Middle East crisis. The campaign for higher gas taxes also has backing from ACT senator David Pocock and the Australia Institute thinktank.

The AMWU's broader positioning is consistent with its recent public communications. Its official website published a budget response stating "A tax cut is not a pay rise" and calling the budget "unimaginative" (AMWU).

The broader context here is the gap between what the union movement's left flank is prepared to articulate and what a Labor government in office is willing to touch. A wealth tax, an inheritance tax and a new top marginal rate above $500,000 are not on the government's agenda. The PRRT reform is the exception, and even there the conference commitment is in-principle only, unbinding on the parliamentary party, and currently shelved by the PM. What the manifesto does is lay down a marker for where a significant industrial faction thinks the policy floor ought to be, if not where it will land.

For conference delegates, the document functions as a pressure statement from the left at a moment when the government is trying to manage expectations across factions. The AMWU is not asking for small adjustments to thresholds. It is proposing structural changes to the tax base that no major party has taken to an election in living memory. Whether that shifts the conference floor or simply registers as a maximalist opening position from a union with a history of punching above its weight on tax policy is the question that the next three days in Adelaide will answer.