Tax law and policy
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John Prebble "General Anti-avoidance Rules as Regulatory Rules of the Fiscal System: suggestions for improvements to the New Zealand General Anti-avoidance Rule" in Susy Frankel and Deborah Ryder (eds) Recalibrating Behaviour: Smarter Regulation in a Global World (LexisNexis 2013). The nature of tax law and its unusual characteristics is the over-riding theme of this paper. The internal inconsistencies of tax law are highlighted by three examples that are discussed at length; those being general anti-avoidance and double tax treaties, private binding rulings on tax avoidance and the interpretation of statements by the Commissioner of Inland Revenue on avoidance questions and the applicability of section BG1of the Income Tax Act 2007. The author proposes options to improve clarity in tax law such as legislating to make it clear that anti-avoidance rules take precedence over provisions of double tax agreements, that private binding rulings made by the Commissioner of Inland Revenue are prevented if they concern avoidance questions that fall under section BG1 of the Income Tax Act and that the Commissioner refrains from issuing interpretation statements on the operation of the general anti-avoidance rule.
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See also John Prebble and Rebecca Prebble “Does the Use of General Anti-Avoidance Rules to Combat Tax Avoidance Breach Principles of the Rule of Law? A Comparative Study” in Susy Frankel (ed) Learning from the Past Adapting to the Future: Regulatory Reform in New Zealand (LexisNexis, 2011).