State-owned enterprises of Australia

In Australia, the predominant term used for state-owned enterprises (SOEs) is government business enterprise (GBE). Various Australian states and territories also have GBEs, especially with respect to the provision of municipal water and sewerage, and many GBEs were privatized in some states during the last decade of the 20th century. Former Commonwealth SOEs include Telstra, established in the 1970s as Telecom and now Australia's largest telecommunications company, was privatised in 1997 by the Howard government. As of June 2010, Telstra owned a majority of the copper wire infrastructure in Australia (while the rest is owned by Optus, formerly the government-owned AUSSAT and now a subsidiary of SingTel) and is pending sale to its former parent, the Australian government, for a non-binding amount of 11 billion Australian dollars, as ducts in the copper wire tunnels are needed to install the fibre optic cable. The Commonwealth Bank, as its name indicates, was also founded as public company before later being privatized.

In Victoria, many GBEs were sold in the 1990s by the Kennett ministry to reduce the level of state debt. The State Electricity Commission of Victoria and the Gas & Fuel Corporation were the best-known government enterprises to be disaggregated and sold.

Australian Government

As of November 2025, there are ten GBEs of the Government of Australia, comprising two Corporate Commonwealth entities and eight Commonwealth companies.[1][2]

The Government also has other public non-financial corporations (PFNCs) that are not prescribed as GBEs:

States and Territories

Australian Capital Territory

The GBEs of the Australian Capital Territory include:

New South Wales

The statutory state-owned corporations of New South Wales include:

Northern Territory

The GBEs of the Northern Territory include:

Queensland

The GBEs of Queensland include:

South Australia

South Australia is notable for having very controversially privatized most of its GBEs:

Tasmania

Tasmania has a considerable amount of GBEs, relative to other states:

Victoria

The GBEs of Victoria include:

Western Australia

The GBEs of Western Australian include:

References

  1. ↑ "Government Business Enterprises". Australian Government Department of Finance. Retrieved 18 November 2025.
  2. ↑ "Paul Fletcher says NBN Co was free to award $77.5m in bonuses under the rules covering government-owned businesses. Is he correct?". ABC News. 23 March 2021. Retrieved 23 March 2021.
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