The only force more ruthless and cynical than the business of big politics is the politics of big business
~ Gregory David Roberts, Shantaram
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~ Ronald Reagan
Tax office row over PwC leaks investigation flares in Senate
Updated
ATO sidelines official who pursued PwC over tax scandal
Edmund Tadros Professional services editor Updated Oct 29, 2025 – 5.23pm, first published at 1.10pm
The man who led a probe into the leaking of confidential government information by PwC partners will be moved to another regulator in a more junior role, a shift that will disrupt multiple inquiries into the firm.
Tax Practitioners Board chief executive Michael O’Neill will become a “specialist adviser” to the Australian Charities and Not-for-profits Commission from November 24, according to an all-staff email sent by Tax Commissioner Rob Heferen on Wednesday morning.
The decision comes after tax officials made six attempts to sideline or sack O’Neill from the role while he led the tiny agency’s broader investigation into PwC despite opposition from the Australian Taxation Office. These attempts included claims that O’Neill was acting illegally in investigating PwC and raising three unsubstantiated bullying claims against him.
The executive move was announced the day after The Australian Financial Review revealed details of new investigations into PwC stemming from its scandal over the leak of confidential government tax information.
The new inquiries will now continue without O’Neill, one of the nation’s most experienced tax investigators. The inquiries include assessing whether PwC’s advisers misused legal professional privilege to stymie probes into their conduct and allegations the firm misled the Foreign Investment Review Board over whether company restructures were done to cut tax bills.
TPB now a feared regulator
O’Neill led the original investigation, which uncovered that a former PwC partner had shared confidential government briefings with partners and clients. The fallout shrank the firm by a third, triggered inquiries into nine other PwC partners and resulted in a major crackdown on the industry.
O’Neill will be replaced on an acting basis by Janette Luu, an assistant commissioner at the Tax Practitioners Board. Heferen told staff the ATO would seek expressions of interest for the role.
O’Neill is being moved to the smaller agency after more than seven years in the leadership role at the Tax Practitioners Board. He has transformed the once little-known agency into a feared regulator with strengthened laws to police the country’s almost 70,000 tax advisers.
O’Neill “was a key part of the machinery” that held PwC to account over the tax leaks matter, said Greens senator Barbara Pocock.
“I’m really disappointed at the loss of Michael O’Neill from the machinery of the TPB and the ATO, and I am very concerned to ensure that he is not paying a political price for all the work that he has done and this is a matter which requires further investigation,” Pocock said.
“It’s hard to overstate the role that Michael O’Neill played as events around PwC evolved. He was a key part of the machinery within the Tax Practitioners Board that held bad actors to account. He was courageous, persistent and honest – all characteristics of a very good leader.”
Pocock added that the inquiries “surfaced multiple attempts to sideline, demote and remove Michael O’Neill from the role”.
An ATO spokesman said that executive changes are “a regular part of our strategy to build diverse experience and enhance leadership” at the agency.
“These movements, planned with input from all involved, are part of our broader approach to workforce management and strengthening our leadership capabilities,” he said. “We anticipate the incoming executive will bring strong experience to the role, ensuring ongoing investigations continue effectively and without disruption.”
In his email, the ATO’s Heferen said O’Neill’s “extensive experience as secretary of the Tax Practitioners Board and former chief risk officer for the ATO will be invaluable in delivering strategic assurance advice to the ACNC”.
Tax Practitioners Board chairman Peter de Cure said: “I congratulate Michael both on his appointment to the important new role at the ACNC and for his significant achievements as CEO and secretary of the TPB.”
Other executives moved, promoted
O’Neill will continue to be classified as a senior public servant, known as Senior Executive Service band 2, and retain his entitlements in the new role.
The Tax Practitioners Board, which has almost 200 staff, and the Australian Charities and Not-for-profits Commission, which polices almost 65,000 charities with a staff of almost 150, are part of the ATO.
Other moves announced in the email, designed to align ATO’s “leadership with strategic priorities”, included promoting Rowan Fox to deputy commissioner of small business, shifting deputy commissioner Rebecca Saint to be head of a new business line known as litigation and legal services, and moving deputy commissioner Marek Rucinski to lead another new business line known as enterprise risk, change and integration.
O’Neill has had a long career at the ATO. He previously led Project Wickenby, a decade-long investigation into the offshore accounts of high-wealth Australians, including Paul Hogan and Glenn Wheatley (Hogan has always denied wrongdoing regarding his tax affairs).
Financial Services Minister Daniel Mulino did not respond to requests for comment.
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Edmund Tadros leads our coverage of the professional services sector. He is based in our Sydney newsroom. Email Edmund at edmundtadros@afr.com.au
ATO sidelines official who pursued PwC over tax scandal
Edmund TadrosProfessional services editor
The man who led a probe into the leaking of confidential government information by PwC partners will be moved to another regulator in a more junior role, a shift that will disrupt multiple inquiries into the firm.
Tax Practitioners Board chief executive Michael O’Neill will become a “specialist adviser” to the Australian Charities and Not-for-profits Commission from November 24, according to an all-staff email sent by Tax Commissioner Rob Heferen on Wednesday morning.
The decision comes after tax officials made six attempts to sideline or sack O’Neill from the role while he led the tiny agency’s broader investigation into PwC despite opposition from the Australian Taxation Office.
The move was announced the day after The Australian Financial Review revealed details of new investigations into PwC stemming from the scandal over the leak of confidential government tax information.
The new inquiries will now continue without O’Neill, one of the nation’s most experienced tax investigators. The inquiries include assessing whether PwC’s advisers misused legal professional privilege to stymie probes into their conduct and allegations the firm misled the Foreign Investment Review Board over whether company restructures were done to cut tax bills.
O’Neill led the original investigation which uncovered that a former PwC partner had shared confidential government briefings with partners and clients. The fallout shrunk the firm by a third, triggered inquiries into nine other PwC partners, and resulted in a major crackdown on the industry.
O’Neill will be replaced on an acting basis by Janette Luu, an assistant commissioner at the Tax Practitioners Board. Heferen, in an email to staff, said the ATO would seek expressions of interest for the role.
Heferen said O’Neill’s “extensive experience as secretary of the Tax Practitioners Board and former chief risk officer for the ATO will be invaluable in delivering strategic assurance advice to the ACNC”.
Other moves announced in the email, designed to align ATO “leadership with strategic priorities”, including promoting Rowan Fox to deputy commissioner of small business, shifting deputy commissioner Rebecca Saint to be head of a new business line known as litigation and legal services, and moving deputy commissioner Marek Rucinski to lead another new business line known as enterprise risk, change and integration.
O’Neill has had a long career at the Tax Office. He previously led Project Wickenby, a decade-long investigation into the offshore accounts of high-wealth Australians including Paul Hogan and Glenn Wheatley (Hogan has always denied wrongdoing regarding his tax affairs).
Tax Practitioners Board chairman Peter de Cure told a parliamentary hearing last year that, under O’Neill, the agency had been “an efficient, effective and focused regulator”. “In the five years that Mr O’Neill has held the position, we have made significant steps forward, both in our internal culture, as an organisation, and in being a modern and effective regulator, from where we were nearly seven years ago when I first joined,” he said.
Comment has been sought from the Tax Practitioners Board and ATO.
Find out the inside scoop about Accenture, Deloitte, EY, KPMG, PwC and McKinsey. Sign up to our weekly Professional Life newsletter.
Edmund Tadros leads our coverage of the professional services sector. He is based in our Sydney newsroom. Email Edmund at edmundtadros@afr.com.au
We’re from the Tax Office and we’re here to help you. The ATO has stopped calling Australians ‘clients’, reverting to ‘taxpayers’ to better reflect its core purpose of collecting revenue.
The Australian Taxation Office has unceremoniously dumped its longstanding official terminology of referring to those compelled to give it money as generic ‘customers’ and ‘clients’ to re-adopt the plain-English and old-fashioned term of “taxpayers”, as the agency tries to recoup its annual “tax gap” of close to $50 billion, or 7.5% of collectable monies.
The sharp shift in the agency’s nomenclature is revealed in a recent missive from ATO second commissioner Jeremy Hirschhorn, officially rebranding the former ATO ‘Client Engagement Group’ to the new ‘Compliance and Engagement Group’.
Commissioner Rob Heferen said it’s a big shift, because it symbolises a move from the corporatist stance of the customer always being right to a more traditionalist rules-are-rules stance.
Hirschhorn told his troops in a recent email that “Our new name more naturally reflects the ATO’s core purpose — collecting tax so the government can deliver services to the Australian community. Our role in this is supporting compliance across the system while maintaining strong, proactive engagement with stakeholders, and our new name is reflective of this role.
“The language of ‘client’ served the ATO well, challenging us (and taxpayers) to think differently about the tax system. Historically, the ATO needed a shift in mindset toward the way we interacted with taxpayers.
“Our reinvention moved us from a more transactional and ‘after the event’ audit liabilities mindset to one that placed greater emphasis on the human side of interacting with the tax office — and the fact that most Australians are honest and will voluntarily comply if we make it easy to do so.”
But like Joy Division T-shirts recently sported by the prime minister and assorted other grunge-chic wares worn by certain tie-less secretaries, vintage vernacular appears to be plainly back in vogue.
Albeit with conditions, Hirschhorn noted:
“Critically, moving on from the word ‘client’ does not change the respect with which we must treat taxpayers in each and every interaction. Equally importantly, ‘compliance’ is not a proxy for ’audits’. It means that we help taxpayers get things right, ideally from the outset, in accordance with our vision:
It is easy to get things right, noting this aligns strongly with the productivity agenda of the government
Help is tailored, which includes giving useful guidance on how the tax system works, but also that we provide taxpayers with the information we hold about them to minimise errors
Where, unfortunately, necessary, deliberate non-compliance has consequences, but even here, we need to act in a way that encourages long-term compliance.
Again, the best compliance, and what we will strive to maximise in our aspirational vision of every taxpayer meeting their obligations, is voluntary compliance at lodgment.”
Never let it be said the ATO doesn’t dare to dream, especially when it comes to certain multinationals — OK, well, all of them — actually paying their way. At least when certain consultancies are trying to redesign both ends of the taxation fence.
Still, Hirschhorn is a glass-half-full kind of technocrat, especially when unnecessar, obsessive rebranding and positioning come into play and waste valuable agency time.
“In good news, there’s no new acronym to learn; we’re still CEG. I encourage you to update your signature block to reflect the name change. If you haven’t yet, I encourage you to read our 2025-26 group plan and think about what it means for your work,” Hirschhorn encouraged.
An ATO spokesperson told The Mandarin that “the terminology change from ‘client’ to ‘taxpayer’ was brought into effect when the ATO’s purpose and vision were updated in March 2025.”
“The decision was made by the ATO executive committee,” the ATO spokesperson said.
“Importantly, moving on from the word ‘client’ does not change the respect with which the ATO treats taxpayers in each and every interaction.”
About the author
Julian Bajkowski
Senior journalist
Julian Bajkowski is a research and technical-driven reporter with over 20 years’ experience in technology and cybersecurity journalism. Julian has also been an adviser in public policy and corporate affairs for Mastercard and eftpos.
