Abstract:
The Australian GST regime treats trusts as entities separate from trustees. This article deals
with the important but deceptively complex matter of when an acquisition is by a trust and when
it is by a trustee. There are no cases on the issue and it is submitted that the Commissioner’s
comments do not provide satisfactory guidance. For this reason an attempt is made to develop
some guiding principles that are both practical and minimise the conceptual dissonance between
the GST regime and the law of trusts.
