In July the Department of Social Services, (Minister Kevin
Andrews), conducted forums in the capital cities to allow
interested groups to discuss the Options Paper which the Department
published earlier that month. The options it suggests to replace
the ACNC are:
- Imposing a self-reporting regime on all
charities, hinging on all charities using their own website to
publish information.
- Returning the determination of charitable
status to the Australian Taxation Office (ATO) (and
establishing some independent decision making).
- Ensuring a proportionate compliance
framework.
- Appropriate transitional arrangements.
The sector will arguably be given a higher level of autonomy
with self-reporting, but unfortunately this will be at the expense
of increased compliance costs and a return to the situation where
not-for-profits must deal with the ATO, whose focus and
understanding of the sector is not as specialised as that of the
ACNC.
