Our latest insights

The New South Wales State Government has been busy with tax reform this year – from the raft of state taxation amendments commencing in May, to the first steps to abolish stamp duty introduced as part of their state budget last week.

As we come to the end of the financial year, its timely to review your upcoming tax compliance obligations. For multinational entities, the disclosures and complexities of tax compliance generally have never been more complex or challenging. Here are some of the main IDS issues to be aware of.

The ATO released its June 2022 final Legal Professional Privilege (LPP) Protocol setting out the ATO's recommended approach for taxpayers to identify LPP communications and making LPP claims to the ATO in response to a formal notice to produce documents.

This financial year was a year of many changes in the R&D space – a new government, borders re-opening Australia to the world, easing supply chain pressures driving opportunities for trade, and an appetite to boost on-shore manufacturing.

At a high level, the Property Tax is intended to replace stamp duty as the method of taxing land in NSW. Stamp duty is a large tax paid upfront once on the purchase of land in NSW, while the proposed Property Tax is a much smaller annual tax, similar to council rates.

Many people are getting excited about the Government’s pre-election promise to exempt electric cars from Fringe Benefits Tax (FBT) as of 1 July 2022. But before you rush to order your new vehicle, there are a few considerations for you to take into account. While this measure is expected to take effect shortly, there is no legislation for this yet – not even in draft – and parliament’s next sitting days have not been announced. This means any new legislation will no doubt need to be retrospective to have effect from 1 July 2022.

As the financial year draws to a close, now is the time for property developers to review their projects and determine whether there has been a change of intended or actual use of any residential premises which may require a GST adjustment under Division 129 of the GST Act.

Australia’s Biotechnology Sector Snapshot 2022, conducted by Ausbiotech and supported by Grant Thornton, has revealed an impressive 43% growth rate in the sector in the past two years.

With only 3 weeks remaining in the financial year, builders should immediately test their compliance with the Queensland Building and Construction Commission’s (QBCC) Minimum Financial Reporting Requirements (MFR) to ensure there is enough time to rectify any deficiencies before FY22/23 year end.

While much of the country is now open, businesses are still navigating the impact of COVID-19 – largely without the assistance of State and Federal Government pandemic-focused support. Therefore, insolvency is an unfortunate and potential reality for many.

It is clear that consumers are demanding more from retail brands. Today our relationships with retail companies has moved past the transactional buy and sell contract, to one that has growing demands around transparency, diversity and good citizenship.

Deceased estates are often a complex situation to navigate, especially when the death of the individual was unexpected, leaving behind issues which can lead to spouses, siblings, extended family, friends and business partners entering into a dispute over the assets to be distributed.