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There has been a major development in the last days of Federal Parliament for this year. For the first time a parliamentarian has made a clear call for reform of the Australian Taxation Office.

Liberal elder statesman Senator Eric Abetz is a former senior minister and government leader in the Senate. Last Wednesday (4 December) he delivered a punchy speech in which he demonstrated why the ATO needs to be reformed. He also outlined a model for how that should be done. More...

It’s not long before we all attempt to eat too much Christmas pudding and hopefully settle down for a decent holiday relax! To all SEA members: our grateful thanks for your support during this very big year. Your membership contributions keep our efforts going, defending the rights of self-employed people.

To all our followers, including the many thousands of our social media watchers: our Seasons Greetings. We’d really appreciate your membership and support. You can join here.  More...

I’ve just completed a two-week research project in Washington DC into the laws governing the operations of the Internal Revenue Service (IRS). The IRS’s operations are starkly and vastly superior to those of the ATO. The difference is in the laws covering the IRS.

Here’s my brief two-minute YouTube overview of what I’ve discovered.  More...

Perhaps we thought we’d seen just about every ‘trick’ by the ATO, but the statements by the Tax Commissioner to the Senate on Wednesday (23 October) go to an entirely new level. The ATO ‘battle bar’ has just been raised, big time!

What has motivated the Commissioner is the ‘Right to Know’ public campaign being conducted by a large coalition of Australian media interests against the government’s suppression of free speech. This week ‘Right to Know’ released its first television/on-line advert. The opening ‘punch’ in the advert asserts that the ATO can take money directly out of people’s accounts “but you’re not allowed to know…”  More...

In 1970, when the Apollo 13 space mission suffered a major malfunction, the astronauts immediately declared to mission headquarters in Houston, Texas: ‘Houston we’ve had a problem’. Here’s a clip from the 1995 Tom Hanks’ movie on Apollo 13 in which he makes the declaration.

Recognising and admitting to a problem is the first, most critical step to fixing it.

Just a week ago Tax Commissioner Chris Jordan finally declared ‘we have a problem’. But, wow, has that declaration been a long time coming! More...

We’re campaigning to create ‘rule of law’ checks and balances on the Australian Taxation Office. But, while we do that, the ATO is pushing parliament hard for new laws to extend its powers, with minimal if any checks and balances. They do this under the excuse of reining in the black economy.

Parliament and the community should not be conned by this ATO power grab. The ATO’s power push perverts both the rule of law and the democratic process. More...

Finally, a reaction is happening from ‘the peoples’ parliament

I was in London in early August networking with key campaigners on UK small business tax issues. This included our long-time friends at contractorcalculator and (separately) the Association for Independent Professionals and the Self Employed (IPSE). The reason for meeting up with our friends was to achieve a deeper understanding of the behaviour of taxing authorities internationally. More...

This is a very special appeal for your help to defend against the ATO small business bully.

We’re asking you to contribute to the legal defence fund for Richard Boyle, the ATO whistleblower. We consider Richard a hero for democracy. He exposed the truth about ATO abuse at great personal risk to himself and his family. We must support Richard.

Richard is facing a staggering 161 years in jail under ATO prosecution. Mass murderers don’t face this. It demonstrates the vindictiveness of the ATO.  More...

I’m in London all this week meeting with key campaigners on UK tax issues and the self-employed.

You might remember this recent news post we put out which summarised the BIG problems that self-employed people have with the UK tax authority (HMRC). Essentially, HMRC is conducting a long-running campaign of ‘double taxing’ self-employed people. Yes, the Brits don’t just have to worry about the cricket and Brexit!! HMRC is attacking self-employed entrepreneurship. More...

Since the Global Financial Crisis, unemployment has dropped to low levels in most of the developed world at least. That’s fantastic. It needs to continue.

One of the important factors in this positive trend seems to be the evolution of work arrangements that enable quick responses to fast-moving markets and consumers. Flexible work creates work! But this gets regulation-lovers worried. They reckon that if work isn’t controlled through government regulation, there’s got to be something wrong. Currently their focus is on the so-called ‘gig’ economy. Apparently, it’s a big ‘problem’ that needs a solution.  More...