Yep, always has been:
Commonwealth payments to the states
– Parliament of Australia
The effect of HFE is that each state can receive either more or less than it otherwise would if the GST revenue was distributed on an equal per capita basis. The amount each state receives is represented by a factor known as its ‘GST relativity’. The relativity can be loosely equated to the amount of GST a state receives for each dollar of GST collected in that state. Relativities since 2000–01 are shown at table 2 below.
Table 2: GST relativities since 2000–01
NSW Vic Qld WA SA Tas ACT NT 00‑01 0.91 0.87 1.02 0.98 1.18 1.51 1.11 4.16 01‑02 0.92 0.88 1.00 0.98 1.18 1.50 1.15 4.02 02‑03 0.91 0.87 1.01 0.98 1.19 1.55 1.15 4.24 03‑04 0.89 0.87 1.02 0.97 1.21 1.60 1.15 4.39 04‑05 0.87 0.87 1.06 1.03 1.20 1.56 1.13 4.27 05‑06 0.87 0.88 1.04 1.03 1.20 1.55 1.14 4.27 06‑07 0.87 0.90 1.02 1.00 1.19 1.55 1.15 4.33 07‑08 0.89 0.90 1.01 0.95 1.21 1.54 1.16 4.37 08‑09 0.91 0.93 0.97 0.88 1.21 1.53 1.17 4.52 09‑10 0.93 0.92 0.92 0.78 1.25 1.62 1.27 5.25 10‑11 0.95 0.94 0.91 0.68 1.28 1.62 1.15 5.07 11‑12 0.96 0.90 0.93 0.72 1.27 1.60 1.12 5.36 12‑13 0.95 0.92 0.98 0.55 1.28 1.58 1.20 5.53 13‑14* 0.97 0.90 1.06 0.45 1.26 1.61 1.22 5.31 14‑15* 0.98 0.89 1.08 0.35 1.25 1.70 1.27 5.47 15‑16* 0.99 0.90 1.05 0.37 1.21 1.78 1.29 5.40 16‑17* 0.99 0.91 1.05 0.38 1.20 1.76 1.28 5.28
You'll notice that Victoria typically gets to keep the least of all of the States of the GST it collects for the Commonwealth. In other words, tax revenues in Victoria and NSW are being transferred to the other States. My understanding is that since Federation the pattern has been for the populous States - NSW and Vic - to subsidise the other States. And that does affect how much the Victorian government gets in grants per head of population, and that affects what can be spent on hospitals etc in Victoria.
The recent WA figures are an aberration as WA has historically been like SA and Tas, but I'm guessing that the mining boom has affected the recent figures.

