On Wed 19.4.2017, the ATO released the following Class Rulings: Class Ruling CR 2017/26– Income tax: scrip-for-scrip roll-over: acquisition of Centuria Metropolitan REIT No. 2 (CMR2) by Centuria Metropolitan REIT No. 1 (CMR1). The ATO says that, subject to certain conditions, a CMR2 Unitholder who makes a capital gain from the disposal of a CMR2 unit…
On Wed 19.4.2017, the ATO issued Superannuation Guarantee Determination SGD 2017/1 asking: Is an advance paid under s28 of the Fair Entitlements Guarantee Act 2012 to a former employee ‘salary or wages’ paid by the employer to the employee for the purposes of working out a superannuation guarantee charge liability under the Superannuation Guarantee (Administration) Act…
The Commissioner has appealed to the Full Federal Court against the decision in Sandini Pty Ltd v FCT [2017] FCA 287. In that decision, the Federal Court had ruled that the CGT marriage breakdown roll-over relief applied where shares were transferred by a former spouse to his former wife’s discretionary trust, rather than to the former wife herself (as…
Re Banks and FCT – Truck driver loses claim for work-related travel expenses above the maximum reasonable amount that can be claimed without formal substantiation per TD 2010/19 and TD 2011/17 The AAT has upheld the Commissioner’s objection decision that had reduced a truck driver’s claims for work-related travel expenses on the basis that he did not…
On 12 April 2017, the OECD noted that Value Added Tax (VAT; also known as Goods and Services Tax, under the acronym GST in a number of OECD countries) has become a major source of revenue for governments around the world. Some 165 countries operated a VAT at the time of the completion of the International VAT/GST…
On 13 April 2017, the Government has released an exposure draft of legislation and associated draft explanatory material for public consultation. This legislation will amend the Income Tax Assessment Act 1997 to give effect to tax reforms announced on 29 June 2015, which expand the tax relief available to superannuation funds, when mandatorily transferring assets…
The decision below and the QSC decision In a complex matter, the Full Federal Court has unanimously allowed the taxpayers’ appeals against the August 2015 decision of Greenwood J in Thomas v FCT [2015] FCA 968. Greenwood J had held that a discretionary trust could not distribute franking credits to an individual beneficiary differently from the manner in which the…
The Government, on Thur 13.4.2017, released exposure draft regulations proposing to expand the definition of “capped defined benefit income stream” to cover additional defined benefit pensions that permit commutation, or would otherwise fall outside the general scope of the provisions. For example, lifetime pensions commuted outside of 6 months from commencement, reversionary child pensions, reversionary pensions commuted…
The Government, on Wed 12.4.2017, released exposure draft legislation proposing technical amendments to resolve certain issues identified with the superannuation reform legislation. The proposed amendments relate to the transition to retirement income stream (TRIS) rules, CGT relief for TRISs, the $1.6m pension transfer balance cap, the concessional contributions cap and the objectives of superannuation. While the…
This guidance builds on the local file – high level design by providing an overview of the detailed design of the local file / master file. It reflects underlying IT specifications (contained in the XML schema) for software developers to use in business management software to enable generation of a valid XML file. We have developed…