Sage fails in tax documents plea

Former Perth Glory owner Tony Sage has failed in his bid to access documents he claimed was used by the Australian Taxation Office for an audit that led to penalty assessments.

The mining entrepreneur sought to reverse the Administrative Appeals Tribunal’s decision that refused him access to documents he alleged were relevant to the commissioner of taxation’s audit of his finances.

Mr Sage lodged an application for judicial review in the Federal Court of Australia’s Western Australian registry, naming the commissioner of taxation, the AAT, the Australian Criminal Intelligence Commission, and the commissioner of the Australian Federal Police as respondents.

Federal Court judge Craig Colvin today dismissed Mr Sage’s application to review the AAT’s decision and ordered him to pay the commissioner of taxation’s costs over the proceedings.

Mr Sage claimed the AAT’s decision involved an error of law, according to his Federal Court application.

In his judgment, Justice Colvin said the AAT made no error in refusing Mr Sage access to the documents.

“There was no error by the tribunal as to the extent or nature of its power to require the commissioner to produce documents,” he said.

Mr Sage revealed his identity as the applicant in the AAT ruling delivered in November 2022 by lodging his Federal Court application for judicial review.

According to the AAT decision, the commissioner of taxation issued penalty assessments for Mr Sage’s income from 2006–2013 after conducting a covert audit prompted by a referral from the Criminal Assets Confiscation Taskforce.

The commissioner also made allegations of fraud or tax evasion, the decision shows.

The applicant was described in the AAT decision as a director of a company that was trustee for his family trust, and a director of several companies in the mining industry.

The AAT decision said the applicant's bank accounts indicated that his lifestyle was funded by a number of sources including credit cards that were predominantly paid by funds from the trustee company or mining companies.

Mr Sage sought to access the legal advice and documents the commissioner had, including the ones provided by the Australian Crime Commission and the taskforce, claiming them to be relevant for the final hearing of his tax dispute.

Justice Colvin today found previous rulings relied on by Mr Sage instead supported a conclusion that documents containing legal advice provided to the original decision-maker were not relevant to the review.

“To be relevant for such purposes, documents must contain material which bears upon the material findings to be made by the tribunal as to the foundation for its decision,” he said in his judgment.

“However, legal advice provided to, available to or acted upon by the original decision-maker as to the law to be applied in making the decision or as to the scope of the decision-making power will not be relevant to undertaking that task.”