澳洲留学生金融学dissertation:基金的自我管理

　　在大多数情况下，我们不希望使用类似“大棒”的方法。我们倾向于允许将基金进行重组，以便尽快地查明问题的真正原因并使得受托人的利益符合税务的相关规定。不得不说的是，如果资金未能采取合理的措施来解决这个问题，我们就会采取更有力的行动。我们需要掌控所有基金的监管状态。

　　In most cases we don’t expect to use a big stick approach. Our preference would be allow the fund to restructure as quickly as possible where there are genuine reasons for the failure and the trustees wish to remain regulated by the Tax Office. Having said that, where funds fail to take reasonable steps to address the problem, we will move to take stronger action. We need certainty around the regulatory status of all funds.

　　至于我们关心的是，个人应该仔细考虑所有相关的问题，然后才作出决定是否需要设立自己的基金。我不会说明任何新的东西，我们主要关心的是，人们需要做好准备，他们让自己变成基金的主导者。

　　As far as we’re concerned, individuals should have carefully considered all relevant issues before making the decision to establish their own fund. I’m not stating anything new in saying that our main concern is that people need to be prepared for what they are getting themselves into.

　　In the past we have had difficulty in assisting with compliance where funds no longer meet the definition of a self managed superannuation fund. For example, we have had cases where the member has rolled all of their benefits into a self managed fund, but was never made a trustee of the fund and then they come to us to provide assistance as the perceived regulator.

　　Today I want to focus on the changes for self managed superannuation funds – both those directly resulting from the law but also other administrative impacts that have been included as part of the overall package of Super Simplification. These changes will help us to increase our regulatory scope and enhance the role we play in the self managed superannuation fund market. I propose that we do this in two parts – the first part of the session I will focus on the legal and administrative changes. I will stop then and see if you have any questions or comments. The second part of this session will start to share with you some of the tools and help products we propose to put in place to support trustees and auditors of self managed funds.

　　In some cases, once they receive their excess contributions assessment a person can apply to the Commissioner for a determination to have their contributions either disregarded or allocated to another financial year for the purposes of working out their excess contributions. However the Commissioner can only make the determination if he considers that there are special circumstances and making the determination is consistent with the object of the new tax. Whether circumstances are special will vary from case-to-case. However, in this context the circumstances must make it unjust, unreasonable or inappropriate to impose the liability for excess contributions tax.

　　The Commissioner has the ability to remit general interest charge and regards these circumstances as those which would warrant the remission of general interest charge. Therefore individuals who give the release authority to their superannuation fund within the 21 days required by law generally will not suffer general interest charge as a result of any delays by the fund in releasing the money.

　　We will be using the Members contribution statements and income tax returns to determine if the caps have been breached – matching across super funds. This will mean that in most cases the excess contribution tax assessments will not issue until after these statements have been lodged and processed by the tax office.

　　However the reasonable benefit limit will be abolished from 1 July 2007. Two important things to note though – people with excessive ETPs and Tax Offsets for the income years before 2007-08 must reflect these in their prior year income tax return. Also, superannuation funds will still have RBL reporting obligations for benefits paid before 1 July 2007 and where a commutation has taken place within 6 months. This is up until 14 January 2008. We will be expecting these reports to continue on a monthly basis.

　　This declaration will provide us with some assurance that the person or people that have committed to running a self managed superannuation fund are aware of their legal responsibilities as a trustee, and know what their regulatory obligations are.

　　Under the old law, auditors have been able to exercise their professional judgment when deciding whether or not to make these reports. There has been some confusion and inconsistency among auditors as to the details that are reported to us.

　　The obligations for auditor reporting are now changing. The Auditor Contravention Report will become an approved form, and this will allow the Commissioner to prescribe the contraventions and associated materiality levels for issues that must be reported to us.

　　I’ve been asked whether we will allow period of grace to allow trustees of self managed funds to get used to the new self managed fund rules. The short answer is no. These new rules don’t change fundamentally what trustees should do – rather they strengthen what we see are good trustee practices for self managed funds. Naturally we will help where we can by providing trustees and auditors with tools to help them understand their obligations.

　　Self managed superannuation funds have been around for some time now and we would expect that the vast majority of these trustees are aware of their responsibilities, and if they are not they should expect the appropriate action from the regulator where they fail to meet their obligations.

　　These expectations have more significance as we recognise that the integrity of the self managed superannuation fund market is crucial to the successful implementation of the simplification measures in general.

　　This brings me to the end of the first part of this session on what we see are the key legal and administrative changes for self managed superannuation funds. In the papers we have handed out today you will have received a prototype of an overview of the changes for self managed funds. We are interested in your feedback as to whether you think this is useful and should be further developed for wider distribution. However I thought we might take five minutes or so to deal with any immediate questions some of you might have.

　　In his speech this morning, the Commissioner outlined the Tax Office’s Business Model which highlights the important role that help and education plays in making it easier for taxpayers to voluntarily comply. With this in mind, and as part of the simplification changes, we have started to explore whether there are further ways we can help both professionals and trustees of self managed super funds to better understand and comply with their obligations.

　　Although we have a number of self managed fund education products that have been very well received in the industry, such as the ‘roles and responsibilities of trustees’, we recognise that further assistance products are necessary, and that we need to provide these products in useful and readily accessible ways. Clearly, as technology changes and as the demographic profile of self managed superannuation funds broadens we need to continually assess and update both the content and the delivery channel of our products if we are to be successful in achieving our goal of helping the funds we regulate comply with their obligations.

　　I want to share with you now some preliminary work we have been doing to progress the development of new and existing help and education products, and also invite you to assist in this work.

　　The package would contain information that trustees will need to know to ensure they are meeting their obligations and responsibilities for the various phases in the life cycle of a fund. It could contain examples, scenarios and questions that trustees could answer to test their knowledge and preparedness for becoming a trustee, http://ukthesis.org/jr/ or for dealing with some of the issues they will face when operating their fund.

　　We are looking for opportunities to integrate these initiatives if possible through the development of an auditor tool. The ‘tool’ is still at concept stage – that means early design stage - however we have done a good deal of user research and conducted a number of co-design sessions with auditors already.

　　We have consulted with our auditor stakeholder working group, made up of industry professionals and set up specifically for Super Simplification. We have conducted visits to auditors in their own working environment to better understand how they work and we have worked with a number of auditors in simulation exercises to assist us to develop and validate our auditor tool concept.