Industry body opposes ATO

Themain opposition groups to the Australian Taxation Office’s (ATO) crack down on mass marketed tax effective schemes have combined to form a peak industry body in order to fund a campaign against the ATO.

The as yet unnamed body, which includes representatives of financial planning and accounting businesses, law firms and a range of groups supporting investors in tax effective schemes, held the inaugural meeting of its steering committee late last month.

The steering committee includes George Gear, a former assistant treasurer with the Keating Government and currently chairman of the Australian Managed Investments Association (AMIA), Leslie Dewar, a Professional Investment Services (PIS) financial planner from Western Australia, and partners from the law firm Wilson and Aitkinson, who have previously set up a fighting fund to take action against the ATO.

At the time of going to print, the new body was preparing to hold the latest meeting of the steering committee, where it is understood it would discuss the arrangements required to raise funds for the campaign against the ATO.

It is understood the new body has already secured strong funding commitments from a major union and an industry body operating in the investment industry, although both groups have chosen to remain anonymous.

The steering committee was also expected to discuss an advertising campaign for the body, including the possibility of newspaper and television ads to ask for donations directly from the public to run the campaign.

A spokesperson for the group last week said its major priority would be to fund court cases against the tax office over discredited tax effective schemes.

The ATO has to this point won comprehensive victories on both the so-called test cases — the Budplan case and the Vincent case — which have been run on the mass marketed tax scheme issue.

The formation of the new body comes as figures released by the ATO show that almost 90 per cent of investors caught up in mass marketed tax effective schemes have accepted its settlement offer.

The tax commissioner, Michael Carmody, announced that 36,300 of the 41,600 people who invested in mass marketed schemes had chosen to take up the offer before the June 21 deadline for doing so.

Under the settlement offer, investors are required to hand back the tax deductions they received from investing in the discredited tax effective schemes in exchange for being excused from having to pay penalties and interest on those deductions.

The spokesperson for the new body says far from creating closure on the tax schemes issue, the deadline for accepting the settlement offer would galvanise opposition against the ATO.