Taxation has been the central professional and academic specialisation of my career for more than thirty years. My expertise extends across the operation of taxation systems as a whole: legislation and statutory interpretation, tax planning and structuring, compliance and administration, international taxation, double tax agreements, trusts and entities, residence and source, cross-border investment, avoidance and integrity provisions, and the resolution and litigation of tax disputes.
I have worked continuously as a tax adviser and planner since 1995. I was historically a registered tax agent in my own right before my professional practice moved into work as a barrister. My practical experience has therefore developed alongside, rather than separately from, my academic career.
My formal preparation combines accounting, professional taxation, law and advanced academic research. I completed my Bachelor of Commerce in Accounting, including taxation, in 1994; qualified as a Chartered Accountant in 1997; completed the Master of Tax at UNSW in 1999; subsequently completed a PhD and a Juris Doctor with First Class Honours; and am now a Fellow of Chartered Accountants Australia and New Zealand, a barrister admitted in Western Australia, New South Wales and the High Court of Australia, and a Trust and Estate Practitioner (TEP).
I was appointed Lecturer in Taxation at Atax, UNSW in 2002, subsequently progressing through Senior Lecturer to Associate Professor in Taxation, before becoming Winthrop Professor of Law at the University of Western Australia in 2014. I remain a Professorial Fellow in Taxation at UNSW.
Taxation is consequently an area in which my academic scholarship, professional practice, teaching, programme development and international expert work have continuously interacted.
Tax Advice, Planning and Professional Practice
My understanding of taxation began in professional practice rather than solely through academic study.
From the mid-1990s I worked extensively in taxation as an accountant and adviser, including as a Taxation Manager. I subsequently operated as an international tax consultant and tax adviser in my own right. I was a tax agent before becoming a practising barrister.
This professional background is important to my approach to taxation. Tax law is not merely a body of legislation and cases. It is a working system within which transactions must be structured, positions identified, returns prepared, advice given, risks evaluated and disputes resolved.
Tax planning requires the ability to move between legal analysis and commercial reality. A technically available position is not necessarily a sensible one. Advice must consider the taxpayer’s objectives, entity structure, transactions, documentation, residence, timing, international connections, integrity provisions, administrative practice and the possibility that a position will eventually need to be defended.
My later work as a barrister adds the other end of the process: interpretation, controversy, evidence and dispute.
I therefore approach tax planning and tax disputes as different stages in the operation of the same system.
Australian Taxation
Australian taxation has been the foundation of my professional expertise.
I have taught the Australian income tax system extensively at both undergraduate and postgraduate levels and across a large range of subjects at UNSW and UWA. At UNSW I taught multiple core taxation subjects and was involved in professional and advanced postgraduate tax education over many years.
I have also delivered intensive taxation and enforcement education for the Australian Taxation Office, including repeated multi-day programmes for ATO officers, and have served as an Australian tax examiner for professional organisations.
My Australian tax expertise includes individual and business taxation, companies, trusts and partnerships, capital gains tax, international taxation, residence and source, distributions, integrity and anti-avoidance provisions, offshore structures, controlled foreign companies, cross-border trusts, international investment and the interaction between domestic taxation and Australia’s treaty obligations.
A particular strength of my work is the ability to connect individual provisions with the architecture of the income tax system. Complex tax problems frequently cannot be solved by reading one provision in isolation. Entity rules, general principles, international provisions, integrity rules and judicial interpretation interact.
This systemic approach has informed both my teaching and professional work.
Tax Interpretation
Statutory interpretation is fundamental to my work as a tax lawyer.
Tax legislation is unusually complex. It combines highly detailed drafting with concepts that have developed through case law, accounting, commercial practice and international agreements. Apparently technical questions can therefore involve difficult issues of language, legislative purpose and legal characterisation.
My legal scholarship has examined interpretation directly, including the relationship between language and legal meaning. My broader work in linguistics has further strengthened my interest in how legal language actually communicates concepts and how meaning changes when terminology moves between languages and legal systems.
Tax interpretation becomes still more complicated internationally. A domestic statute, a bilateral treaty and the law of another jurisdiction may all be relevant to the same transaction. Terms that appear linguistically equivalent can perform different functions within their respective systems.
My approach therefore combines close textual analysis with attention to structure, purpose, precedent and the institutional context in which the provision operates.
Tax Disputes and Litigation
My professional progression from accountant and tax adviser to barrister has given me experience across the different stages at which tax issues arise.
A dispute changes the character of a taxation problem. What may initially have been a planning or compliance question becomes a question of legal rights, statutory construction, evidence, administrative decision-making and ultimately judicial determination.
My academic work has correspondingly addressed tax administration, default assessments, rule of law, statutory interpretation and international tax disputes.
I have also organised and participated in specialist professional work concerning federal tax litigation.
I am particularly interested in the relationship between substantive tax liability and the mechanisms through which that liability is established and contested. A tax system consists not only of rules defining liability but of assessments, information gathering, administrative decisions, objections, evidentiary requirements, review and judicial remedies.
Postgraduate Tax Education
I have played a substantial role in the design of postgraduate taxation education as well as its delivery.
At UNSW I served for many years in postgraduate leadership at Atax. I was involved in the development of the Master of International Taxation and developed or jointly developed advanced courses dealing with international taxation, international tax law and policy, double tax agreements and Chinese taxation.
In 2004 I developed a dedicated course dealing with Chinese taxation and its wider investment and legal environment. I have continued teaching China-related taxation substantially ever since.
After moving to UWA, I developed the Master of Taxation programme in 2015, including ten taxation units, and have managed the postgraduate tax programme and taught the majority of its curriculum over the subsequent decade.
This has required breadth as well as specialisation. Designing an entire postgraduate tax programme requires understanding how the different parts of taxation fit together: foundational concepts, entities, transactions, trusts, companies, capital gains, international taxation, tax administration, policy, interpretation and advanced specialist areas.
International Taxation
International taxation is one of my strongest areas of specialist expertise and has been a central focus of my teaching, research, professional work and international expert activity for more than two decades.
I developed the Master of International Taxation at UNSW and have designed and taught advanced international taxation subjects. I also delivered repeated intensive international taxation programmes to senior officials of the Korean National Tax Service and to the Australian Taxation Office.
My work encompasses the practical architecture of international taxation: residence, source, foreign income, permanent establishments, cross-border business structures, controlled foreign companies, foreign tax relief, withholding taxation, trusts, international investment, profit allocation, treaty interaction and international tax planning.
It also encompasses the larger international system within which these rules operate.
I have published in leading international taxation outlets, including the British Tax Review and the Bulletin for International Taxation, on international tax law, controlled foreign companies, tax treaties, international organisations and the changing international tax regime.
Since 2015 I have served as an international taxation expert for the United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific. My work for the United Nations has included international tax avoidance, international tax cooperation, the interests of developing countries and proposals for institutional cooperation in the Asia-Pacific.
I have addressed international taxation in Australia, China, Hong Kong, Singapore, Korea, Russia, Ukraine, Latvia and other international settings.
This experience has led me to approach international taxation as an actual international system rather than merely as the collection of different countries’ foreign-income rules.
Double Tax Agreements
Double tax agreements are a particular area of specialist expertise within my international taxation work.
I have researched, published and taught extensively on DTAs and developed specialist postgraduate teaching devoted to them. I have also convened a conference specifically on DTAs in China and have repeatedly addressed treaty questions in professional and academic presentations.
My work encompasses both the detailed operation of treaty provisions and the underlying structure of treaty law: residence and dual residence, permanent establishments, business profits, passive income, beneficial ownership, allocation of taxing rights, treaty interpretation and the interaction between treaties and domestic law.
I have published specifically on China’s tax treaties and beneficial ownership and, with Kathrin Bain, on the case for an Australia-Hong Kong DTA. My wider research has examined treaty networks throughout China and Southeast Asia and the role DTAs play in structuring international investment.
I have also examined DTAs critically rather than assuming that concluding a treaty is necessarily beneficial to both states. My work has considered how treaty provisions distribute taxing rights between capital-exporting and capital-importing states and what this means particularly for developing economies.
The practical and theoretical dimensions are closely connected. To evaluate a DTA as policy, one first needs to understand precisely what the treaty does to transactions and taxing rights.
China Taxation
Chinese taxation is one of my longest-standing specialist areas and sits at the intersection of my expertise in taxation and my broader work as a China scholar.
I have studied Chinese taxation for more than two decades, developed dedicated university teaching in the field, undertaken extensive field research with Chinese tax officials, held visiting positions in Chinese public-finance institutions and participated directly in Chinese tax-law reform.
I advised in connection with the development of China’s enterprise taxation and later worked on the proposed Chinese Basic Tax Law, producing recommendations and draft legislation for the National People’s Congress with other international experts.
My research has addressed enterprise income taxation, tax administration, tax avoidance and evasion, default assessments, Chinese tax treaties, beneficial ownership, foreign investment, enterprise concepts, tax integrity, localisation of administration and the interaction between Chinese taxation and the international tax system.
I have also written technical accounts of China’s taxes for international tax and planning publications.
This means that my Chinese tax expertise is not limited to knowing the legislation. It encompasses the way Chinese taxation has developed and actually operates: the relationship between central rules and local administration, different categories of enterprise, foreign investment, administrative practice, documentation, enforcement and the institutional environment within which tax liabilities are determined.
The broader social and institutional implications of this work are addressed elsewhere in my scholarship. For taxation purposes, however, the essential point is that I have studied the Chinese system from legislative, professional, administrative, empirical and international perspectives.
Singapore Taxation
Singapore taxation is another area in which I have longstanding technical expertise.
I first studied the Singapore tax system in the late 1990s and have taught Singapore taxation since 2001. My work has included both Singapore domestic taxation and Singapore’s position within international taxation and Southeast Asian cross-border investment.
I have maintained this expertise through teaching, research and professional examining.
I have served as a curriculum adviser and examiner in Singapore international taxation for the Chartered Institute of Taxation and as an independent expert reviewer of the postgraduate taxation programme at the Singapore University of Social Sciences.
I have also been a Visiting Scholar at the National University of Singapore Faculty of Law.
My published and comparative work frequently examines Singapore alongside China, Hong Kong and other regional jurisdictions. This has included the structure of its income tax, territorial and foreign-income issues, residence, international investment, treaty relationships, regional tax planning and Singapore’s role as a financial and commercial centre.
The combination of long-term teaching and external examining is significant. Maintaining responsibility for assessing advanced professional knowledge requires continuing familiarity with the operation and development of the system rather than historical knowledge of its broad structure.
Hong Kong Taxation
I have taught Hong Kong taxation since 2002 and have incorporated Hong Kong extensively into my research on international taxation, China and regional tax systems.
Hong Kong is particularly important because its tax system is structurally distinctive. Understanding it requires close attention to territorial taxation, source, profits taxation and the relationship between a relatively narrow domestic tax base and Hong Kong’s role as an international financial and investment centre.
My research has examined Hong Kong both independently and comparatively with mainland China and Singapore.
I have published specifically on the potential Australia-Hong Kong treaty relationship and have written extensively about regional taxation involving Hong Kong. I have also presented specialist work in Hong Kong, including a keynote concerned with reform of the Hong Kong revenue regime and comparative analysis of the tax bases of Hong Kong, China and Singapore.
My work on residence, DTAs and international planning has similarly required detailed engagement with Hong Kong taxation.
Hong Kong also provides an important practical connection between my China and international tax expertise because cross-border structures frequently require simultaneous understanding of mainland Chinese, Hong Kong and third-country taxation.
Trusts, Private Wealth and Cross-Border Taxation
Trust taxation and private wealth form another significant specialist strand of my work.
My professional standing as a Trust and Estate Practitioner complements my academic and legal work concerning trusts. I have advised, researched and presented on family trusts, offshore trusts, international trust taxation, section 99B, asset protection, residence and cross-border private investment.
International private wealth questions are particularly demanding because several legal systems may interact simultaneously. The legal character of a trust, the residence of trustees and beneficiaries, the source and character of income, distributions, foreign entities, treaty provisions and domestic integrity rules can all affect the outcome.
My China work has added another dimension through questions concerning Chinese private investment in Australia and the treatment of trusts within Chinese taxation.
This is an area in which taxation, trusts law, international taxation and professional planning converge.
Tax Administration and Enforcement
I have also maintained a sustained interest in the administrative operation of taxation.
Early in my academic career I delivered intensive tax enforcement education for the Australian Taxation Office. My Chinese field research subsequently examined how tax liabilities were actually determined by officials, including circumstances in which administrative practice differed significantly from what a reading of legislation alone might suggest.
My publications have addressed default assessments, administrative leadership, integrity and rule-of-law questions.
This experience has reinforced an important principle in my tax work: knowing tax legislation is not identical to knowing a tax system.
A working tax system includes taxpayers, advisers, administrators, assessment practices, information systems, enforcement, review mechanisms and courts. Expertise in taxation therefore requires understanding how these components interact.
Tax Policy and Institutional Questions
A substantial part of my scholarship considers taxation at a level beyond the technical operation of particular provisions.
I have researched efficiency, equity, simplicity and integrity; the relationship between tax design and social institutions; fiscal capacity and development; corruption; administrative leadership; international allocation of taxing rights; regional cooperation; and the relationship between taxation and rule of law.
My PhD examined whether apparently standard income-tax concepts operate differently when placed within different social and institutional environments.
These broader questions are developed more fully in my work in political economy, sociology and China studies. They remain important to my taxation expertise because they explain why tax systems have particular structures and why technically similar rules can operate differently between jurisdictions.
But my tax scholarship does not begin and end with institutional theory. It is grounded in detailed knowledge of the actual law and operation of taxation systems
Russia and Comparative Tax Systems
My comparative tax work has also extended beyond the jurisdictions in which I have my greatest expertise.
I have studied Russian taxation formally and published with Evgeny Gugylyvatyy on Russia’s controlled foreign company regime, using Australian experience as a comparative perspective.
I have also presented international tax research in Russia, including work at the Financial University in Moscow concerning international tax reform and BEPS.
Other research and teaching has taken me into taxation systems across the Asia-Pacific and Europe.
These comparative experiences reinforce my understanding that international taxation cannot be mastered solely from the perspective of a single domestic system.
Research and Publication
Taxation dominates a substantial part of my publication record.
My work ranges from highly technical analysis of particular statutory and international tax problems to broader research on the architecture of tax systems.
Topics have included controlled foreign companies, residence, DTAs, beneficial ownership, enterprise taxation, cross-border distributions and group transactions, trusts, offshore structures, tax administration, default assessments, avoidance, international investment, international tax disputes, statutory interpretation, tax integrity and regional and international tax cooperation.
My edited book on taxation in China and ASEAN brought together domestic tax systems, regionalism, institutional development and the international taxation environment.
This breadth reflects the way I understand taxation itself. It is simultaneously a technical legal system, an area of professional planning, an administrative system, a field of international law and a central instrument of government.
My Expertise in Taxation
Taxation is the field in which the different elements of my professional career most completely converge.
I have worked continuously in tax advice and planning since 1995. I have practised as an accountant, tax agent, consultant and barrister. I hold advanced qualifications in accounting, taxation and law. I have taught taxation at university level since 2002, progressing from Lecturer in Taxation to Associate Professor and then Professor of Law. I have designed individual tax courses and complete postgraduate programmes. I have trained tax administrators, examined professional tax specialists, advised governments and international organisations, participated in tax-law reform and published extensively across domestic and international taxation.
My principal specialist strengths include Australian taxation, international taxation and double tax agreements, together with particularly extensive jurisdictional expertise in China and longstanding expertise in Singapore and Hong Kong taxation.
International taxation and DTAs have become especially significant within my work. My involvement has extended from detailed planning and interpretation through university programme design, advanced professional education, research and publication to international expert work for the United Nations.
The breadth of this experience shapes the way I understand tax expertise. It is not enough to know what a provision says. A tax specialist needs to understand how the provision fits into the tax system, how it interacts with entities and transactions, how administrators and courts interpret it, how taxpayers plan around it, how it operates across borders and treaties, and what happens when the resulting position is challenged.
My work in taxation has therefore been concerned throughout with the tax system as a working legal system: from the design of a transaction and interpretation of legislation, through assessment and administration, to objection, dispute and judicial resolution.
