Income Tax Point-in-Time Service Updates

The Income Tax Point-in-Time Service has been updated to include the new amending Acts Treasury Laws Amendment (2019 Measures No. 2) Act 2019 (Cth) (Act 94 of 2019), and Treasury Laws Amendment (2019 Tax Integrity and Other Measures No. 1) Act 2019 (Cth) (Act 95 of 2019), and the new amending regulation Taxation Administration Amendment (Updating the List of Exchange of Information Countries) Regulations 2019 (Cth).

Act 94 of 2019

Schedule 1 to the Act amends the tax law to extend the concessional taxation treatment for genuine redundancy and early retirement scheme payments to amounts paid to individuals who are 65 or more years of age provided the dismissal or retirement occurs before they reach pension age.

Schedule 2 to the Act amends the luxury car tax refund arrangements for eligible primary producers and tourism operators to provide a full refund of luxury car tax, up to a cap of $10,000, for eligible vehicles.

Schedule 3 to the Act expands the board of the Australian Energy Regulator from three members to five members and makes other changes to ensure that the expanded board can operate efficiently.

Schedule 4 to the Act creates a requirement that consumer data rules include an obligation on accredited data recipients to delete consumer data right (CDR) data in response to a request from a CDR consumer for that CDR data.

Schedule 5 to the Act amends the Superannuation (Unclaimed Money and Lost Members) Act 1999 (Cth) to correctly allow for regulations to be made to prescribe a rate of interest which is payable on amounts held by the Commissioner which are proactively reunified into a person’s superannuation account, as originally intended. Schedule 5 to the Act also amends the Superannuation (Unclaimed Money and Lost Members) Regulations 1999 (Cth) to prescribe a rate of interest payable on inactive low balance accounts and amounts proactively reunified by the Commissioner.

Act 95 of 2019

Schedule 1 to the Act amends Schedule 2D to the Income Tax Assessment Act 1936 (Cth) ("ITAA 1936") (which applies to tax exempt entities that become taxable) to specify the basis for working out the market value of Taxation of Financial Arrangements ("TOFA") assets and liabilities entered into on concessional terms held at the transition time for the purposes of applying the TOFA provisions; and modify the operation of the TOFA balancing adjustment that is made when the entity ceases to have such a TOFA asset or liability.

Schedule 2 to the Act amends the tax law to prevent the small business CGT concessions in Division 152 of the Income Tax Assessment Act 1977 (Cth) ("ITAA 1977") from being available for assignments of the income of a partner and other rights or interests in the income or capital of a partnership that are not a membership interest in the partnership.

Schedule 3 to the Act amends the ITAA 1997 to deny deductions for losses or outgoings incurred that relate to holding vacant land under certain circumstances.

Schedule 4 to the Act amends the ITAA 1936 to extend to family trusts the anti-avoidance rule that applies to other closely held trusts that undertake circular trust distributions. This allows income tax to be imposed on circular trust distributions at a rate of tax equal to the top marginal tax rate plus the rate of Medicare levy.

Schedule 5 to the Act amends the Taxation Administration Act 1953 (Cth) ("TAA 1953") to allow taxation officers to disclose the business tax debt information of a taxpayer to credit reporting bureaus when certain conditions and safeguards are satisfied.

Schedule 6 to the Act amends the TAA 1953 to confer on the Commissioner functions and powers to develop and/or administer a framework or system for electronic invoicing.

Schedule 7 to this Act amends the Superannuation Guarantee (Administration) Act 1992 (Cth) to improve the integrity of the superannuation system by ensuring that an individual’s salary sacrifice contributions cannot be used to reduce an employer’s minimum superannuation guarantee contributions.

Taxation Administration Amendment (Updating the List of Exchange of Information Countries) Regulations 2019

This instrument amends the Taxation Administration Regulations 2017 (Cth) to add eight countries to the list of foreign countries and foreign territories specified to be ‘information exchange countries’ for the purposes of subsection 12-385(4) of Schedule 1 to the TAA 1953.  

These new amendments have been updated in the Point-in-Time Income Tax Service current to 12 November 2019. (NB: subscription required).

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