The big for-profit nursing home companies are using the same "tricks and schemes" as tech giants to minimise the amount of tax they pay, even though the vast majority of their funding comes from the public purse.

Nursing homes get big government funding but appear to minimise their tax. Credit:Stock

Multinational Bupa has complex offshore structures and related party transactions; Opal Aged Care uses inter-company loans at inflated interest rates; Allity has paid no tax for two years; and some of the richest family-owned operators do not even issue financial reports.

Almost all nine big companies surveyed in a new report by the Tax Justice Network appear to use trusts as part of their company structures, which can obscure how much profit they are making.

Between them, the six largest for-profit companies were given over $2.17 billion in government subsidies – 72 per cent of their total revenue – and made profits of $210 million per year between 2016 and 2018.