Issue: 373
Sent: 21-01-2010 13:59:02
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Three Issues This Week
Tony Negline
Since our last email just before Christmas, all has been reasonably quiet on the regulatory front.
a. Tax Reform
We know that the Government has the Henry tax review report. The politicians will now spend sometime contemplating which parts of the review they want to immediately accept, which parts they wish to delay and which parts they want to reject.
We will not see the report and the Government's response until such time as it wants to maximise the political impact from the report.
There is no point trying to speculate what is in or out of the report. It would appear that a few leaks are making their way into the media. For example, rumours of reintroducing cost base indexation for CGT.
Ultimately what really matters is how the politicians - on all sides of the political debate - react. One of the reasons most of the Ralph Review's tax reforms were legislated was because it had the support of both major political parties.
It will be interesting to see if the Henry Review achieves this.
b. Intergenerational Report
The Australian newspaper is reporting a speech given by the Prime Minister arguing that unless productivity increases over the next two decades at a faster rate than the recent past then our economy will not be big enough to cope with the fiscal demands of population ageing.
None of this will be new to long-time readers of this publication. We've been saying much the same for many years.
c. ATO pronouncements
Earlier this month the Tax Office took the opportunity to withdraw many Interpretative Decisions. Many of these will probably not be of much interest to you as they involved diesel fuel rebates and excise duty.
Another set of IDs involve Capital Gains Tax and other lovely topics.
Some of the withdrawn documents involve the Small Business CGT Concessions. Many of the withdrawals come about because of new legislation passed in recent years. For example the world wide assets of non-residents.
At the same time some new Interpretative Decisions have been released. Some of these will be of interest. In particular a ruling about the tax treatment of futures contracts in a Self Managed Super Fund.
There is also an ID which confirms that an adult child will be a dependant for a part of the taxation of super fund death benefits.
The ATO has also issued a new version of its guide to SMSF auditors.
Finally please consider purchasing a copy of my book. You can look at the contents page at the following link: http://www.atcbiz.com.au/smsfbooktoc.pdf
Two options are available - once only subscription - $55 inc GST - or an annual subscription will gives you access to all the updates made throughout the year ($120 inc GST).
The book can be purchased at the following link: http://www.atcbiz.com.au/smsfstore.php
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