Rob Coyte's Blog

A major concern was the fact that the government was thinking about tinkering with franking credits derived by individuals and superannuation funds from their Australian share portfolios. However, Wayne Swan as effectively quashed these rumours by saying “I personally think dividend imputation has delivered an enormous benefit to the Australian economy”.

However, there will be changes at some point and one such change may be in the Transitional to Retirement Strategy which will impact anyone over 55 years old. This being the case we would implore you to discuss with us your options before the upcoming budget because very rarely are these changes applied retrospectively.

The government has already announced a whole range of measure to make it harder for individuals to gain access to Family Tax Benefits, Seniors Concession Cards and other benefits by changing the definition of income. These measures will be introduced on 1 July 2009 please refer to  article titled Definition Changes to Income For Government Benefits for more information or contact our office.