23 Jun

Earlier this month, Jack Colley (a Senior Associate of West Garbutt) presented the following paper which he co-authored with Alex Whitney (a Principal of West Garbutt), at The Tax Institute’s Agribusiness Intensive. The paper discusses the full lifecycle of a dispute – from risk and review to audit and objection, providing practical strategies for dealing with the ATO and effectively managing disputes. Link to paper. ...

09:34 / CGT / Corporate groups / GST / Income Tax / Private wealth families / Providing support to other accountants and lawyers / Small to medium enterprises / Tax audits and reviews / Tax objections / Tax practice areas
19 Jun

Principal Mark West and Senior Associate Hugo Southcott's paper on a practical walk-through of the decisions and tax mechanics that sit behind “just do the trust distribution”, using a prior-year fact pattern that can get complicated by current-year activities (sale of assets, dividends received, and changed beneficiary tax profiles). This case study will demonstrate: How to think about distributions and what is it we’re actually trying to distribute (and why the deed definition matters) What are the distributions to be made? Are we talking about income or capital? The practical sequencing to consider when you’ve got ordinary income, capital gains, and franked distributions Making...

14:53 / CGT / Income Tax / Providing support to other accountants and lawyers / Tax practice areas / Trusts and Equity
10 Mar

Principal Dung Lam and Senior Associate Hugo Southcott authored and presented the following paper at The Tax Institute’s Private Business Tax Retreat on Friday 27 February 2026. The paper explores the tax and duty issues which arise when a discretionary trust vests and discusses the ways that a trust’s vesting date may be extended, in light of the 1 August 2025 changes to the Queensland perpetuity law made by the Property Law Act 2023 (Qld). To access this document, please click To extend or not to extend. ...

14:42 / CGT / Income Tax / Stamp Duty / Trusts and Equity
13 Jun

In this paper prepared for the Tax Institutes 2025 Trusts Intensive, our principal Mark West and special counsel Alex Whitney discuss the proper legal characterisation of unpaid present entitlements (UPEs) with reference to the pivotal High Court decision of Fischer v Nemeske. Also covered are tax issues associated with UPEs, including whether UPEs have a cost base, bad debt deductions and commercial debt forgiveness issues associated with forgiving UPEs, and the tax consequences more generally of assigning, discharging or forgiving UPEs (including CGT event C2). ...

15:32 / CGT / Income Tax / Stamp Duty / Trusts and Equity
06 Jun

Division 7A is still an evolving area of tax law. In this article, we discuss an emerging risk area for Division 7A where private companies are partners in a partnership, in the context of an unpublished change in the ATO’s view. We include in this article our views on this risk and as well as practical mitigation strategies for taxpayers. ...

14:27 / Income Tax
23 Mar

Following on from his previous published views on a correct interpretation of section 100A, West Garbutt Principal – Director, Mark West has provided further comment following the BBlood decision (by Thawley J), the decision by the Full Federal Court in the Guardian AIT appeal and the issue by the ATO of its final ruling TR 2022/4. Mark submits there remain significant unresolved inconsistencies between the ATO's approach in TR 2022/4  - and the words of section 100A and the case law. To access this paper, please click: Section 100A update ...

12:51 / Income Tax
22 Mar

West Garbutt Senior Associate, Alex Whitney, wrote and presented a paper on trust deed drafting mistakes and how to fix them for Legalwise on 28 February 2023. The paper will help readers on how to identify and fix bad drafting and the limits on doing so. To access this paper, please click: Trust Drafting ...

11:59 / Trusts and Equity
27 Sep

West Garbutt Principal - Director, Mark West has authored the following paper on the 'ordinary family or commercial dealing' exceptions in section 100A of the Income Tax Assessment Act 1936. The decision of BBlood Enterprises Pty Ltd v Commissioner of Taxation [2022] FCA 1112 is thoroughly analysed by Mark on the basis of valuable guidance in relation to this section of the Income Tax Assessment Act 1936....

08:42 / Income Tax
20 Jun

West Garbutt Principal - Director, Mark West has authored the following paper for Taxation in Australia Vol 56(11). This paper challenges the view that tax purpose limits the extent of the "ordinary family and commercial dealing" exclusion from the meaning of "reimbursement agreement" in s 100A of the Income Tax Assessment Act 1936. This “tax purpose based” view is central to the position reflected in the ATO’s TR 2002/D1 and PCG 2022/D1. But a disciplined analysis of the exact words of s 100A in the context of the approach to statutory interpretation prescribed by the High Court, and past case...

16:00 / Income Tax