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Sladen Snippet - Changing the way wills can be contested

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Sladen Snippet - Changing the way wills can be contested

The Victorian government passed the Justice Legislation Amendment (Succession and Surrogacy) Act 2014  on 16 October, prior to going into caretaker mode leading up to the election.

The Act includes significant amendments to the laws governing the contesting of wills.

Since the removal of any relationship requirement between a claimant and a deceased person in 1996, the courts have dealt with a wide range of claims. These claims are not only by spouses and children of the deceased person, but also grandchildren, nephews and nieces, carers and even neighbours.

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Sladen Snippet - ASIC’s expectations for directors

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Sladen Snippet - ASIC’s expectations for directors

In a recent speech to the Australian Institute of Directors, Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC) chairman Greg Medcraft outlined ASIC’s expectations for directors. Previous speeches focused on the director’s role as a gatekeeper, and Mr Medcraft has said this will continue to be a focus for ASIC.

The chairman stated that directors should ensure their company has strong internal and audit compliance functions. He stated these functions are worthless unless the directors back it up with supervision and review, and that these processes are ingrained in the company’s culture. He considered culture a very important point and stressed directors should drive the right compliance culture in the workplace.

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Sladen Snippet - Withdrawing a benefit provided under your enterprise agreement may contravene your “no extra claims” clause

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Sladen Snippet - Withdrawing a benefit provided under your enterprise agreement may contravene your “no extra claims” clause

A Victorian water authority was found to have contravened the no extra claims clause in its enterprise agreement, in a decision handed down by the Fair Work Commission (FWC) last week. The authority made changes to a vehicle policy which provided some employees with limited private use of work vehicles.  The enterprise agreement itself contained no provisions dealing directly with the provision or private use of motor vehicles.

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Sladen snippet – Recent successes with excess contributions

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Sladen snippet – Recent successes with excess contributions

Sladen Legal had two recent successful applications to disregard or reallocate excess non-concessional contributions, with the result that significant excess contributions assessments were extinguished or reduced to a nominal amount.

In the first case the client inadvertently triggered the bring forward rule by paying what she thought was an insurance premium, but was in fact a contribution to a retail superannuation fund (that in turn funded an insurance policy held by the fund). The client also made a $150K non-concessional contribution in that year followed by a $450K in the following year (causing excess non-concessional contributions of over $150K). The Commissioner of Taxation agreed that special circumstances existed and agreed to reallocate the “insurance” contribution to the second year reducing the excess contributions tax from over $70K to approximately $1,500.

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Sladen Snippet – Power to correct errors on the PPSR

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Sladen Snippet – Power to correct errors on the PPSR

Justice Gleeson of the Federal Court of Australia has provided further clarification surrounding the power of the Registrar to correct errors on the Personal Property Securities Register (PPSR) in the case of SFS Projects Australia Pty Ltd v Registrar of Personal Property Securities [2014] FCA 846.

In this case, SFS Projects Australia Pty Ltd (SFS Projects) was assigned three security interests that were already registered on the PPSR. A mistake was made by the assignor who incorrectly changed the end date of the registrations, instead of changing the name of the secured party, to SFS Projects. If the error was not corrected, SFS Projects would be deprived of the benefits of a continuously perfected security interest under the Personal Property Securities Act 2010 (PPSA).

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Sladen Snippet - No Restraint, No Worries

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Sladen Snippet - No Restraint, No Worries

APT Technology Pty Ltd (APT) won a rare injunction in the Federal Court last week, obtaining orders that prevented a former employee from soliciting or dealing with APT clients for five months, even though the employee was not subject to any contractual restraint of trade obligation.

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Sladen Snippet - ATO releases guidelines regarding professional firms

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Sladen Snippet - ATO releases guidelines regarding professional firms

New guidelines released by the Australian Taxation Office (ATO) will assess tax compliance risks associated with the allocation of profits from professional services firms operating in the accounting, architectural, engineering, financial services, legal and medical professions.

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Sladen Snippet - Proposed amendments to the Owners Corporation Act 2006 and the Sale of Land Act 1962

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Sladen Snippet - Proposed amendments to the Owners Corporation Act 2006 and the Sale of Land Act 1962

The Consumer Affairs Legislation Further Amendment Bill 2014 (Bill) is currently before the Victorian Parliament. The Bill seeks to amend several Acts, including the Owners Corporation Act 2006 and the Sale of Land Act 1962.

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Sladen Snippet - Transfer of Land Amendment Bill 2014 – proposed introduction of priority notices

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Sladen Snippet - Transfer of Land Amendment Bill 2014 – proposed introduction of priority notices

The Transfer of Land Amendment Bill 2014 (Bill) has been introduced to the Victorian Parliament. The Bill proposes a number of amendments, including provisions to facilitate the phasing out of paper certificates of titles in preparation for the introduction of electronic conveyancing system.

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Sladen Snippet - “Like the Titanic, it Sank Ignominiously” – Director jailed for breach of duties

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Sladen Snippet - “Like the Titanic, it Sank Ignominiously” – Director jailed for breach of duties

A South Yarra accountant was today sentenced in the Melbourne County Court to five years and eight months jail on charges relating to the loss of at least $67 million dollars of investors’ money in property investment schemes controlled by him.

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Sladen Snippet - Transfers of cash and property from private companies in family law settlements

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Sladen Snippet - Transfers of cash and property from private companies in family law settlements

On 30 July 2014 the Australian Taxation Office issued Taxation Ruling TR 2014/5 (previously released in draft form as TR 2013/D6) to address the tax effect of private companies paying money or transferring property to shareholders or their associates, in order to satisfy Family Court orders made pursuant to section 79 of the Family Law Act 1975.

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Sladen Snippet - Loan from an SMSF to an unrelated unit trust, not an in-house asset

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Sladen Snippet - Loan from an SMSF to an unrelated unit trust, not an in-house asset

The Australian Taxation Office (ATO) has confirmed in ATOID 2014/23 that a loan from a self managed superannuation fund (SMSF) to a unit trust, where the SMSF and its related entities held less than 10% of the units in the unit trust, and did not otherwise ‘control’ the unit trust, will not be treated as an in-house asset.

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Sladen Snippet - ATO confirms adult children can be super dependants

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Sladen Snippet - ATO confirms adult children can be super dependants

The Australian Taxation Office has confirmed in ATOID 2014/22 that an adult child can be a death benefits dependant under the superannuation laws. In the particular facts of the ATOID, the adult child had given up work to care for a terminally ill parent and received no financial support from anyone, other than the parent, during that time. The child was found to be both financially dependent on, and an interdependent of, the child’s mother. Consequently, any death benefits paid to the adult child would be tax free.

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Sladen Snippet - Supreme Court grants an injunction against a sham registration on the Personal Property Securities Register

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Sladen Snippet - Supreme Court grants an injunction against a sham registration on the Personal Property Securities Register

There is no requirement to file the underlying agreement that gives rise to a security interest on the Personal Property Securities Register (Register).  This has the potential to give rise to fake or sham registrations because the Register cannot determine if a registration is in fact a genuine security interest. This creates a situation where the Register can be compromised by the lodgement of sham registrations.

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Sladen Snippet – Changes to the PPSA definition of motor vehicle

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Sladen Snippet – Changes to the PPSA definition of motor vehicle

Effective from 1 July 2014, the definition of “motor vehicle” under the Personal Property Securities Act 2009 (PPSA) has been amended to include a motor vehicle that:

- is capable of travelling at more than 10km/hr; and
- has a total motor power greater than 200W.

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Sladen Snippet – .MELBOURNE, .MONASH, .AFL? – Internet expansion with new top level domain

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Sladen Snippet – .MELBOURNE, .MONASH, .AFL? – Internet expansion with new top level domain

It’s happening.  The internet is changing, growing, expanding.  The .com domain will soon be competing with specific business-owned domains for greater visibility and control on the internet.  What does this all mean?

It means there will be many more domain names available for registration.  Business will have the ability to carve their own personal internet space by obtaining their own top level domain.  And us internet users will see, over time, many more top level domains emerging so web addresses will change too.

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Sladen Snippet - Changes to the Primary Production Exemption for Land Tax

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Sladen Snippet - Changes to the Primary Production Exemption for Land Tax

The Victorian State Revenue Office has recently released General Information Bulletin GEN 2/14 in relation to recent duty and land tax changes that received Royal Assent on 17 June 2014. Of particular note is the change to the area defined as “Greater Melbourne” for the purposes of the Primary Land Tax Exemption.

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Sladen Snippet – Extending unfair contract term protections to small businesses

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Sladen Snippet – Extending unfair contract term protections to small businesses

The Australian Government has released a consultation paper which seeks to protect small businesses from the burden of unfair contract terms in standard form contracts. 

Unfair contract terms go beyond what is necessary to protect the legitimate interests of the party seeking to include the terms in the contract (for example a large corporate business). These terms create a significant imbalance in the rights and obligations of the parties to the contract. Similar provisions currently exist to protect consumers in dealing with businesses.

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Sladen Snippet - Employee Share Schemes and Startups

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Sladen Snippet - Employee Share Schemes and Startups

The consultation period with interested stakeholders in relation to Employee Shares Schemes (ESS) after the issue of the Employee Share Schemes and Start-up Companies: Administration and Taxation Arrangement discussion paper reported on in August last year has now ended.