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Two Decades: 14 Feb 2004 to 14 Feb 2024 - Behind the $430m Wickenby saga
Offshore tax leaks went beyond the ‘dirty six’, Senate told
Neil ChenowethSenior writer
The Tax Practitioners Board’s ongoing PwC investigation has found the involvement by international partners in sharing confidential Australian Treasury documents was far broader than the six unnamed individuals that the big four firm’s global arm has reported.
TPB chief executive Michael O’Neill told estimates on Wednesday the findings produced for PwC International by the Linklaters law firm was “not consistent with our reading of the emails”.
PwC International is resisting requests by the Tax Office and the TPB for the release of the Linklaters report, which details the wrongdoing of overseas partners, on the grounds that the report is privileged and confidential.
A summary of the report referred to six international partners who received confidential information which was originally obtained by former Australian partner Peter Collins, who breached a confidentiality agreement he signed with Treasury.
“There’s more than just the ‘dirty six’?” Liberal senator Richard Colbeck asked Mr O’Neill.
“It’s much broader than that, Senator,” Mr O’Neill said. “It does appear to us that communications between Australian and PwC International blended issues around the private and the public consultations [by Treasury].”
He said the leaked information offered PwC International the opportunity to have international influence on the shaping of the OECD’s project to target multinational tax avoidance.
“Our investigation is targeting communication that happened at that time between the national firm and the international firm … whether that raises regulatory issues,” he said.
Project North America
“It wasn’t just they were trying to gain advantage for the firm in Australia but also to gain advantage in shaping what would happen in this policy on an international basis.”
Redacted emails published by the Senate last May showed that PwC partners in Britain, the US, Ireland and Singapore received emails which referred to the confidential information obtained by Mr Collins and other PwC partners.
An email cache showed that the firm put together an international team, dubbed “Project North America”, to exploit the confidential information by developing structures designed to sidestep new taxes Mr Collins was helping to design.
Finance Minister Katie Gallagher paid tribute to Tax Commissioner Chris Jordan for his last appearance at estimates before he steps down at the end of the month after 11 years. But his farewell appearance was peppered with questions over testimony by Mr O’Neill last Friday that the Tax Office had attempted to influence the TPB investigation of PwC.
Under questioning by Greens senator Barbara Pocock, Mr Jordan denied that a change to the status of the TPB’s chief executive announced by former assistant treasurer Michael Sukkar in March 2022 would apply to Mr O’Neill.
‘I’m really shitty about it’
“It never actually got implemented or seen,” Mr Jordan said.
The move would give the TPB chairman the power to sack the CEO. Mr Jordan confirmed there was to be a “no returns” policy whereby a sacked CEO could be barred from returning to the Tax Office, but not Mr O’Neill.
Mr O’Neill said the draft contract he was shown did not refer to the no returns policy, but he said, “It was made clear that it would be applied to me”. It was contingent on legal advice to ensure that the no returns policy would be lawful.
“I have the perception that Mr O’Neill was leaned on,” Senator Colbeck said. “I’m really shitty about that. This is an important matter for us. The effective operation of our system here is important.
“Our support for Mr O’Neill – and I don’t think I’m verballing other members of the committee to say – is absolute, because we think he did terrific work to get an outcome with respect to the investigation that the TPB undertook.”
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Neil Chenoweth is an investigative reporter for The Australian Financial Review. He is based in Sydney and has won multiple Walkley Awards. Connect with Neil on Twitter.Email Neil at nchenoweth@afr.com.au
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