The Tax Office is watching
John Jamieson writes: Re. “The tax man is watching: new surveillance force for ATO” (Thursday). As a small business owner living in a rural area in the south-west of Western Australia, I have been watching all the convoluted schemes set up by corporations and the various methods being used to evade and dodge payment of tax on a massive scale. The whole of the Corporations Law, set up by big international firms of lawyers and accountants, with their lackeys who call themselves “politicians”, have been perpetrating shonky arrangements ever since the days of the Rum Corps in New South Wales. Nothing ever gets done to track down these global pirates and bring them to account, as our system has been so cleverly infiltrated by their lobbyists and paid hacks that our surveillance agencies have no teeth.
Every now and then we hear of a “drug bust” or a company being fined for breaking some rather insignificant part of the employment laws, or avoiding paying an apprentice their superannuation, but nothing is done about the billions being laundered around and the third-world countries (called “tax havens”) where these “corporate entities” have kept their earnings and huge profits out of the public’s eyes. In the meantime, we see all kinds of nonsense being presented as “tax reform”, whilst completely avoiding adoption of the real reforms that people like Ken Henry wanted to introduce.
Yes, John J… Ken Henry. He was quite possibly the smartest man in town, but was almost totally ignored when he tried his hardest to improve “the system”.
One suggestion would be for the current government to trawl a few of the forgotten reports left over from the Rudd & Gillard years to generate some real policies.
I don’t recall what Henry recommended in relation to overseas tax havens. Possibly, something along the lines of the States’ legislation re bikie gangs?
Great letter, John Jamieson.
However, I doubt much will be done about this situation, especially while the perpetrators ‘friends’ are in government.
I read somewhere recently, that it has become almost impossible (politically) to do anything about many of the rorts and handouts interwoven throughout the tax system in this country.
Guess we will just have to wait for the revolution!!
On a slightly different note: if you think things are bad now in the corporate sector in Oz, have a read of the article by Dr. Matthew Mitchell in the ‘Independent Australian’, “Abbott Set to Sign Highly Secretive TPP* Agreement this Month” (*Trans-Pacific Partnership). Very scary stuff!
And to understand why, go to ‘The Center for Media and Democracy’ website, and read ALEC Exposed. About time we heard from Crikey on this whole business, as well.
It certainly won’t be appearing in any MSM newspaper in this country until after it’s a done deal!!