ParlInfo - Economics Legislation Committee : 09/10/2025 : Estimates
The tax agent watchdog has closed its final PwC cases, marking the end of a long-running probe into the firm’s misconduct.
Tom Ravlic
OCT 13, 2025
The Tax Practitioners Board has completed its work on the PwC tax leaks saga, with the outcome in four remaining cases revealed during Senate estimates.
TPB chair Peter de Cure told Senate estimates that the tax agent regulator has completed the nine-case job lot that landed in its inbox after the first two sanctions against PwC Australia and its former partner, Peter John Collins, were revealed in January 2023.
PwC Australia received an order to report back to the TPB every six months on how it was changing its internal processes to better manage confidentiality agreements and conflicts of interest.
Collins had his tax agent registration terminated and was prohibited from reapplying for two years.
De Cure and his board then had nine cases to deal with arising from further examination of evidence obtained by TPB investigations.
Four out of the nine cases were dropped late last year, given that the TPB’s disciplinary committee deemed there was no case to answer.
De Cure told Senator Barbara Pocock during a late-night estimates appearance that the remaining five were all given varying penalties.
The most significant of those was former PwC Australia chief executive officer Tom Seymour, and his penalty was announced in September. Seymour was the partner in charge of the tax division at the time the historic confidentiality breach took place.
De Cure told the assembled senators that there were three individuals who would remain anonymous who were given cautions for misconduct during the tax leaks saga.
There is one final case, however, the TPB cannot publicise because an individual against whom the board has recommended a harsher penalty than a caution is appealing the sanction in the Federal Court.
“The tax agent in that matter is exercising their appeal rights, and the Federal Court has provided confidentiality orders in relation to that matter, so I am not at liberty to discuss that matter any further than to say that,” de Cure.
“In summary, all five of those previously outstanding cases have been concluded to the point where the TPB has made findings and issued sanctions.”
De Cure agreed to respond to a question on notice from Pocock regarding whether the three individuals who were given a caution are still working at PwC Australia, as the Australian Greens’ senator expressed concerns about whether the culture at the firm had really changed.
Pocock had expressed concern to the Department of Finance about its readmission of PwC Australia into the ranks of government suppliers earlier this year because she and Senators Richard Colbeck and Deborah O’Neill believed the firm still had questions to answer in relation to the tax leaks saga.
De Cure said the culture of organisations such as PwC Australia is critical to how they comply or fail to comply with the various professional and legal obligations as a part of the community.
“I can only say that PwC are very well aware now of their obligations under the code of conduct in the [Tax Agent Services Act],” De Cure said.
The Australian Federal Police also appeared before Senate estimates and told Senator Deborah O’Neill that their investigation into the PwC matter was ongoing, and it remained complex with both domestic and international aspects to the AFP’s work.
