Union push for corporate tax consultants to reveal meetings with government
The major accounting firms and other consultants would be forced to disclose all meetings with the federal government and the Australian Tax Office under a policy proposal to be debated by the ALP National Conference.
If adopted, a future Labor government would also force ministerial staffers to observe a cooling-off period of 12 months before joining any of the big four accounting companies.
The proposal, to be advanced by the union United Voice and backed by unions on both sides of the factional divide, is an attempt to counter the aggressive “tax planning” undertaken by corporate Australia and foreign multinationals and expose their deep links in Canberra.
The effectiveness of tax planning has been laid bare at the Senate inquiry into corporate tax avoidance, which has heard evidence that multinationals like Apple, Google, Microsoft, BHP Billiton and Rio Tinto have downsized their tax bills by billions of dollars by diverting profits to Singapore and other tax havens like Bermuda.
The lobbyist Code of Conduct has been credited with shielding federal governments from the corruption scandals that have engulfed state governments, but there is no requirement for executives working directly for the big four to disclose meetings on a public register.
Currently, KPMG is the only one of the big four that lists any staff on the lobbyist register even though accounting firms boast in their promotional material about their privileged access to government, Treasury and the ATO.
Deloitte has a specific team with “public sector expertise” which is tasked with “assisting government revenue agencies seeking to introduce new or reform existing” tax laws.
PriceWaterhouseCoopers tells clients it is a “trusted adviser” to federal and state government departments. Ernst & Young says it has “networked teams … [which] maintain effective tax authority relationships”.
There are also numerous boards, committees and forums stacked with representatives of the big four and the largest law firms that help steer government policy.
The Board of Taxation, for example, is chaired by Michael Andrew, who was chairman and chief executive of KPMG until July last year. The board also includes John Emerson, a consultant to law firm Herbert Smith Freehills, Mark Pizzacalla, a tax adviser at accounting firm BDO and Craig Yaxley who was a 30-year veteran of KPMG.
National Secretary of United Voice David O’Byrne said the community was demanding transparency after the revelations of aggressive corporate tax planning.
A Labor source in Canberra said the idea was up for discussion but might be hard to implement due to the sheer number of interactions but Mr O’Byrne disagreed. “Consultants and government should have no worries implementing a public register if there is nothing untoward going on,” he said.
Mr O’Byrne will not be able to lead the push at the conference. He resigned on the weekend and will hand over to United Voice’s national president Jo-Anne Schofield.
Transport Worker’s Union boss Tony Sheldon said his union would support the motion at the conference but would like to see a register extended to the legal fraternity as well.
