Recent raids show that the taxman's negotiations with wrongdoers will be of the bare-knuckle kind. A veteran tax consultant, Gordon Cooper, compares Trevor Boucher and Michael Carmody and parallels the Commissioner’s term in the office with a long term behind bars in the BRW article dated 23 June 2005. According to Cooper, Michael Carmody will be unlikely to accept a third seven-year term. ‘You do not necessarily do 14 years for murder; it is a tough job.’ And he predicts Carmody’s post-ATO role could be a finance post with the OECD. The article suggests that Michael D’Ascenzo or Jennie Granger who occupy the offices next to Carmody’s could be the likely Commissioners. [Locally and globally, Assistant Commissioner with the initials of JC is growing in popularity: Some men are destined to be gentle giants] Tax cheats beware: No Mercy
Eye on Politics & Culture of Fear: What’s legal? What’s ethical?
What can we get away with? How do you measure up?
Like John, I decided that in approaching this task I had better do some research. Having done that it soon became obvious that ethics and taxation has been the subject of intermittent debate over many years, and I have to say without any general resolution. Views are generally polarised, each premised on what is said to be good public policy principles. Thus on the one hand, you have the view that derives from the role of taxation and its important community nature. This view is reflected in the often quoted notion of taxes being 'the price we pay for a civilised society'. On the other hand you have and equally principled rule of law view. Our society is based on the rule of law. To overlay any other measure, so this school of though goes is to introduce inappropriate subjectivity to this guiding principle. Continuing this line of logic leads to the conclusion that its people’s rights and advises responsibilities to minimise tax, including it seems taking advantage of loopholes provided by the courts and legislation.
• The integrity of the tax-system [Tax Commissioner Michael Carmody learnt some painful lessons from his old boss Trevor Boucher, who lacked delicacy when pursuing rich and well-connected tax avoiders. Boucher was hounded mercilessly until he eventually retired Carmody's softly, softly approach delivers windfall ; It's being billed as the most sweeping tax fraud investigation ever conducted in Australia Probe uncovers $300m in unpaid taxes ; The Tax Office is preparing to triple the size of a data-matching program that makes it far harder for taxpayers to cheat on their capital gains tax declarations Tax Office will target capital gains cheats ; A celebrity lawyer has launched an 11th hour bid to avoid being questioned over an alleged multi-million dollar tax fraud involving tax havens, false documents and prominent sportspeople and entertainers Stars' lawyer faces tax scam trial ]
• · Listening to Paul Keating recently and listening to Malcolm Fraser last night one has to wonder why politicians start to talk sense only when they can no longer make a difference: Former prime minister Malcolm Fraser has criticised the federal Government's anti-terrorism policies, saying they have created a "secret police" and a culture of fear Australia 'secret police' state; In his Fulbright Public Lecture, delivered earlier this week at the University of Melbourne, George Williams looks at the lessons of Australia’s response to terrorism Balancing national security and human rights ; Mr Carr said NSW Police was working "hand-in-glove" with ASIO and the Australian Federal Police on counter-terrorism ASIO raids have Carr's full support ; Melbourne criminal lawyer Rod Stary today accused federal Attorney-General Philip Ruddock's office of cowardly leaking defamatory information about anti-terrorism raid Ruddock accused of raid leak: Terror leaks run deep; It's rattling the cages at this stage More raids, still no arrests; Google: Web Wide World Watching Wild Invaders
• · · Labor is preparing for more internal bloodletting with former leader Mark Latham set to dump on his replacement Kim Beazley and the entire party - Loner: Inside a Labor tragedy Labor waits as Latham locks and loads ; Mark's career – short, spectacular and Labor through and through - world of self-made umpires ALP hits back at 'rat' Latham ; Staff in the Federal Workplace Relations Minister's own department have used a protest to accuse their boss of "hypocrisy" Workplace Minister's staff in IR protest: PM brushes off dissent on industrial law ; Bradon Ellem and Russell Lansbury: The gap between high- and low-income workers is about to widen Tough times ahead as proposed workplace reforms miss the boat
• · · · I live in # 20 Sydney, but I visited if ever so briefly # 3, 4, 6, 7, 11, 12, 15, 16, 17, 21 and both Budapest and Amsterdam at 24 [What # is Prague I wonder ...] Top 25 World's Most Expensive Cities ; Millionaire mile record topples; In 10 years, Glenwood has gone from cabbages, cauliflowers and tomatoes to houses, backyards and garages; from productive agricultural land popular with Maltese immigrants to a suburb chock-full of families Productive land lost for good under creeping suburban tide ; Corridors of Power Your money, ill spent ; Then, in a dramatic 11th-hour gesture, the Polish Prime Minister, Marek Belka, and his Czech counterpart, Jiri Paroubek, led a group of former Communist nations in offering to forgo some of their countries' cash in the interests of a deal 'Pathetic. Tragic. Embarrassing.' And then things got really nasty ; Applying the theories of the enlightenment may not be so enlightened More to the poverty trap than money
• · · · · Is it futile, or useful, to compare such punishments? The future of criminal law, by Michael Kirby ; The tax office and corporate regulators have signalled a softly-softly approach to businesses that have trouble with the new superannuation choice laws that start from Friday ATO, ASIC to go softly on new super laws
• · · · · · Police Commissioner Ken Moroney has given one of the state's top officers until the end of the week to respond to allegations concerning a $6000 desk and other furniture purchased for his police office Explain table purchase, Moroney tells top cop ; THE senior leadership of the NSW Police is in disarray with yet another executive officer at the centre of a corruption investigation that could destroy his career.
Senior Assistant Commissioner Dick Adams – touted as a successor to Commissioner Ken Moroney Moroney's crisis ; Moroney denies NSW police in crisis