Page 388 - Week 03 - Thursday, 1 June 1989
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Issues
On 5 May 1989 the Minister made a Determination under section 99 of the Taxation (Administration) Ordinance 1987. (Attachment 1.)
The Determination imposes duty at conveyancing rates in respect of the transfer of any interest in land in the ACT held by a company or unit trust which is not listed for quotation on an Australian or prescribed stock exchange.
There are differences in the detailed application of the ACT law
and that of the corresponding laws in the States/NT. The ACT
Determination is not restricted to companies or unit trusts where
realty represents a given percentage of the total assets of the
business or to any specified value of the realty and applies to
any interest transferred. While the States/NT are not entirely
in harmony, in general their laws apply to companies/unit trust
where land represents 80t or more of the business assets, exceeds
$1 million in value and (in respect of companies) a majority
share holding is involved.
The arbitrary limitations introduced in the States/NT reflected policy considerations applicable to those jurisdictions and the desire to limit administrative workloads in taxation offices. It is understood that because the provisions were initially introduced as an anti-avoidance measure to prevent large scale duty losses from movements in property ownerships, they were targeted at the major and more obvious avoidance arrangements.
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