On 10 September 2022, the Senate passed the Treasury Laws Amendment (Enhancing Superannuation Outcomes For Australians and Helping Australian Businesses Invest) Bill 2021 with no amendments. It therefore awaits assent. The Bill passes various Budget Superannuation measures, to encourage superannuation contributions, and a temporary extension of the measures to allow capital expenses to be deductible in…
In the High Court CFMEU v Personnel Contracting case (see related TT article), the Court held that the characterisation of a relationship, as that of an employee or an independent contractor, is answered by considering the rights and obligations as set out in the written contract (unless the contract is challenged as a sham or its…
On 9 February 2020 the High Court held that an individual was the employee of a labour hire company (not a contractor, as described in his contract with that company). However the High Court did this on a basis that could be described as seismic, when it comes to the ’employee’ v’s ‘independent contractor’ definition…
On 11.2.22, the Tax Institute emailed members (in TaxVine 3) the views of their Senior Advocate: Robyn Jacobson, CTA, on the existing laws about the interlocking income tax and FBT treatment, of the costs of COVID-19 tests and the necessity of the recently announced changes to the law. They are to ensure the deductibility of…
Four years after suspending their guidelines relating to the allocation of profits of professional firms, the Australian Taxation Office (“ATO”) released PCG 2021/4 (“Guidelines”) setting out its revised compliance approach. The Guidelines provide for a “traffic light style” risk assessment framework containing three risk factors that allow certain professionals to self-assess their risk of ATO compliance…
The ATO has successfully appealed an AAT decision which had overturned the Commissioner’s disqualification of a trustee of a self-managed superannuation fund (SMSF). The AAT had affirmed a non-compliance notice given to the SMSF for multiple breaches of the SIS Act but set aside the ATO’s decision to disqualify the trustee under s126A of the…
On 8 February 2021, the Government announced that it would introduce specific legislation to ensure that the cost of Covid-19 Rapid Antigen Tests (RATs) would be both tax deductible (if work related) and FBT exempt for employers. The Prime Minister assumed it was deductible/FBT exempt on 22 December 2022, when defending the Government’s decision to…
The SMSF Association has released its 2022-23 Federal Budget submissions, including a call for the simplification of transfer balance caps (TBCs); the number of total super balance (TSB) thresholds to be reduced; indexation of key small business CGT concession thresholds; redrafting of the non-arm’s length expenditure (NALE) rules; compliance relief for minor breaches by non-geared…
The Corporate Collective Investment Vehicle Framework and Other Measures Bill 2021 was introduced in the House of Reps on 25 November 2021 proposing to introduce a corporate funds management vehicle to be taxed as an AMIT (a CCIV). It was promptly referred to a Senate Committee, which delivered its report on 3 February 2022. The recommendation was that Parliament…
The Tax Institute has made its submissions to the Government about what they ought address, in their 2022-23 Federal Budget. The Budget is currently scheduled to be handed down on 29 March 2022 (see this article about how this knits with the election cycle, and the chances of it being changed). The Institute gave the…