New Bill – Requiring DGRs to Register as Charities
October 2020 | Insights | Jae Yang
Treasury has recently published an Exposure Draft of its proposals to reform the Income Tax Assessment Act 1997 (Cth) to require non-Government Item 1 Deductible Gift Recipients (DGR) to register as charities. These reforms are part of the Commonwealth Government’s recent initiatives to reform and simplify DGRs, as proposed in its 2017-2018 Mid-Year Economic and Fiscal Outlook.
The Exposure Draft proposes amendments to the following 11 DGR categories to require the relevant fund, authority or institution in these categories to be an Australian Government agency, a charity registered with the ACNC or to be operated by an Australian Government agency or a charity registered with the ACNC:
- Health—public fund for hospitals
- Health—public fund for public ambulance services
- Education—public fund for religious instruction in government schools
- Education—Roman Catholic public fund for religious instruction in government schools
- Education—school building fund
- Education—public fund for rural school hostel building
- Approved research institute—approved research institute
- Welfare and rights—public fund for persons in necessitous circumstances
- Environment—public fund on the Register of Environmental Organisations (REO)
- Cultural organisations—public fund on the Register of Cultural Organisations (ROCO)
- Fire and emergency services—fire and emergency services fund
Interested parties are able to make submissions to Treasury up until 4 December 2020. If you have any queries, please contact Jae Yang.
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