Tim Stewart The Inland Revenue has issued a final statement (Income tax: scenarios on tax avoidance) which considers whether New Zealand's general anti-avoidance rule (GAAR) would apply to three instances. The final statement follows the release in May 2014 of a draft statement. The GAAR and the draft statement were considered in an article in the September issue of International Tax Review (see "NZ Inland Revenue releases draft GAAR guidance", August 29 2014). As explained in that article, when determining whether an arrangement is a tax avoidance arrangement and therefore subject to the GAAR, Inland Revenue applies a parliamentary contemplation test. Under this test, the question is: "Does the arrangement, viewed in a commercially and economically realistic way, use (or circumvent) the relevant [specific] provisions in a manner that is consistent with parliament's purpose?" If not, the arrangement will be a tax avoidance arrangement unless the tax avoidance is "merely incidental" to some other purpose or effect.
December 16 2014