Jack Aquilina

Expertise

Jack is a Senior Associate within Holding Redlich’s tax litigation and disputes practice, where it is his role to represent clients engaged in the tax disputes process and to manage interactions with revenue authorities, including tax audits and reviews.

Jack has proven experience deploying a strategic, commercial, and evidence-based approach to managing reviews, audit and complex litigation which has enabled him to achieve commercial and principled outcomes in the best interests of his clients within the tax system.

Jack represents taxpayers of all sizes during the tax litigation and disputes process. His experiences have enabled him to resolve disputes at all stages, including at audit, on objection and through available alternative dispute resolution, such as mediation and the ATO’s ‘in-house facilitation’ program. Jack also acts for taxpayers in disputes against the ATO and other regulators, in the Administrative Appeals Tribunal, Federal Court, Full Federal Court, State Supreme Courts and the High Court.

In addition to his practice at Holding Redlich, Jack is a sessional lecturer at Deakin University Law School, where he lectures in Tax Law, Criminal Law, Criminal Procedure, Evidence Law and Statutory Interpretation.

Jack also has experience practicing as tax disputes lawyer within the tax controversy practices of two of the ‘Big 4’ professional services firms and is a former Senior Associate to three senior judges of the Court of Appeal of the Supreme Court of Victoria, in Victoria.

Experience

Jack's experience includes:

• acting for taxpayers of all sizes in disputes with revenue authorities and other regulators in the Administrative Appeals Tribunal, Full Federal Court, State Supreme Courts and the High Court of Australia
• resolving disputes at all stages in the tax disputes cycle, including at audit, on objection and through available alternative dispute resolution such as mediation and the ATO’s ‘in-house facilitation’ program
• assisting medium to large multinational clients and private groups to strategically respond to and commercially resolve complex formal/informal ATO reviews. This includes managing and strategically responding to ATO justified trust reviews such as SARs, CARs and NARs
• advising taxpayers on legal professional privilege and administrative concessions (i.e accountants’ privilege and board privilege) when responding to audits, reviews or in the course of litigation
• assisting a large number of Australia’s Top 1000 entities and private groups to manage their tax corporate governance and compliance regimes
• advising clients as to the revenue consequences of their transactions and corporate structures, particularly in respect of minimising tax risk and to enable early compliance
• providing second and/or independent review and legal opinions on key tax risk issues to assist in risk management decisions
• reducing penalty and interest exposure for taxpayers, including preparing voluntary disclosures, defence files, reasonably arguable position papers and private ruling applications
• advocating for taxpayers in respect to complicated and novel matters arising under both commonwealth and state revenue law, including:
  Part IVA, diverted profits tax (DPT), controlled foreign company rules (CFC), continuity of ownership (CoT) and same/similar business tests, transfer pricing, employment taxes, tax residency, capital / income, capital gains tax (including foreign resident exemptions under Division 855), hybrid mismatch rules, double taxation treaties, petroleum resource rent tax, payroll tax, goods and services tax (GST), film producer offset and the R&D tax incentive.