Australia’s government says it will make recent rules to force large tech companies to pay local publishers for information.

The long-awaited selection sets out a successor to a globe-first law that Australia passed in 2021, which was designed to make giants like Meta and Google pay for hosting information on their platforms.

Earlier this year Meta – which owns Facebook and Instagram – announced it would not renew settlement deals it had in place with Australian information organisations, setting up a standoff with lawmakers.

The recent rules, announced on Thursday, will require firms that earn more than A$250m ($160m; £125m) in annual returns to enter into commercial deals with media organisations, or uncertainty being hit with higher taxes.

The design of the scheme is yet to be finalised but it will apply to sites such as Facebook, Google and TikTok.

In a statement, Meta said it was concerned that the government was “charging one industry to subsidise another”.

Unlike the previous model, the recent framework – called the information Bargaining Incentive – will require tech firms to pay even if they do not enter deals with publishers.

“Digital platforms receive huge budgetary benefits from Australia and they have a social and economic responsibility to contribute to Australians’ access to standard journalism,” Assistant Treasurer Stephen Jones said on Thursday.

The previous information Media Bargaining Code saw information organisations discuss commercial deals with tech giants, while also committing firms like Facebook and Google to invest millions of dollars in local digital content.

That code aimed to address what the government called a power imbalance between publishers and tech companies, while offsetting some of the losses traditional media outlets have faced due to the rise of digital platforms.

As deals brokered under that arrangement neared expiry, Meta said that it would not be renewing them, leading to a roughly A$200m deficit in returns for Australian publishers.

Instead, Meta said it would phase out its dedicated information tab – which spotlights articles – on Facebook in Australia, and reinvest the money elsewhere.

“We recognize that people don’t arrive to Facebook for information and political content… information makes up less than 3% of what people around the globe view in their Facebook feed,” it said in a statement in February.

The announcement prompted a powerful response from Prime Minister Anthony Albanese’s government, which described the shift as “a fundamental dereliction” of Meta’s “responsibility to its Australian users”.

“The uncertainty is that misinformation will fill any vacuum created by information no longer being on the platform,” Communications Minister Michelle Rowland said at the period.

The recent taxation model begins in January 2025 and will be cemented into law once parliament returns in February.

The government says it will be designed to make tech companies pool Australian journalism in swap for responsibility offsets, not to raise returns.