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[News Thetan]

Senate probe into tax-free credentials - ABC Online
27 June 2010, 5:54 pm

Former members of the Church of Scientology today will tell of the need for charities and religious groups to pass a public benefit test to receive a tax-free status.

Independent Senator Nick Xenophon has introduced a bill to Parliament which he says would ensure organisations which are not paying tax are of benefit to Australians.

He says the Senate inquiry will hear evidence for and against the proposed test, like one which applies in the UK.

"It's been very successful and it's important that we look at adopting such a test here in Australia," he said.

"Genuine religions, genuine charities have nothing to fear from this.

"This is about ensuring a level of scrutiny and accountability that doesn't exist in the system that we have now."

found at http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2010/06/28/2938392.htm

[mefree]

Inquiry hears Scientology cash siphoned overseas

A parliamentary inquiry has heard claims the Church of Scientology leaves members to fund local charitable activities out of their own pockets, as it siphons donations to church officials overseas.

The Senate committee was formed after Independent Senator Nick Xenophon raised concerns about Scientology, and proposed changes to tax law that would require religions to pass a public benefit test in order to be exempt from income tax.

The Church of Scientology says the bill is being used as a platform to continue Senator Xenophon's "witch hunt on a recognised religion".

On Monday the inquiry heard from a roundtable of five former Scientologists, who said the organisation charged its members fees of hundreds of millions of dollars, but directed very little of the money to charitable projects.

One of the group, Paul Schofield, told the inquiry he was tasked with receiving money from a program in Nepal when he was the executive director of the church's drug rehabilitation program for Australia, New Zealand and the south Pacific region.

He says the program was sponsored entirely by its executive director, a retired police superintendent.

"I wanted to request that the International Association of Scientologists help this guy out, because he wasn't able to collect money from it. He had something like 65 addicts that he was trying to treat via the Narconon program," Mr Schofield told the committee.

"He was in severe financial distress and I attempted to get the International Association of Scientologists to actually fund this. After all, the International Association of Scientologists was part of Scientology, and Scientology was using this drug rehabilitation in Nepal as an example of their outreach programs.

"I was told there would be no way in the world they would help bail this guy out, he had to handle it himself."

Mr Schofield said the director was basically broke, but was being forced to continue the rehabilitation program at his own expense and pay a tithe to Scientology.

"He was supposed to pay me 10 per cent of his money for management expenses, which I then spent: sent some to Narconon International, I sent some directly to a church body called the Association for Better Living and Education, which is a Sea Org management unit in the church.

"Although he was a charity, there was no money going to be sent to him, unless it was raised by him or people with him, and he's working in one of the poorest countries of the world."

Mr Schofield agreed when committee chair Alan Eggleston asked if his main objection was that the church was siphoning off money.

'Unconstitutional'

Louise McBride, who appeared as a taxation lawyer for the church, questioned whether the inquiry was unconstitutional, saying it was not appropriate for tax amendment bills to be initiated in the Senate.

She also said the proposed amendment would determine which religions were worthy of tax exemptions and which were not, which she said flew in the face of the constitution's provisions on religion.

Ms McBride referred to a 1983 case when the High Court of Australia ruled Scientology could legally claim to be a religion.

"All the judges say, basically to paraphrase, that when bureaucrats and the government get involved with deciding what is and what isn't religion, and enacting laws that impede on that, it does go to religious freedom," she said.

Scientology spokeswoman Virginia Stewart said there was often a big difference between what was reported about her organisation in the media, and real life.

"Some people say some things, but is it true? Can it be proven? Is there proper evidence? Is there a whole evidence base of it, or not?" she said.

"I think trial by media is one issue we have seen in relation to the Church of Scientology - very much so."

When asked about drug rehabilitation program funding, Scientology spokesman Michael Gordon said the organisation's books were prepared by accountants and were publicly available.

The spokesman said he would be happy to provide the committee with details of what funds were sent to the head organisation in the United States.

The Church of Scientology provided a statement to ABC News Online outlining its charitable programs, which include drug education and prevention, disaster relief, and work to defend human rights and promote the UN's universal declaration of human rights.

It did not provide any official comment on Mr Schofield's allegations.

found at http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2010/06/29/2939759.htm?section=justin

[mefree]

Public Benefit Test Potentially Damaging - Pro Bono Australia
29 June 2010, 2:17 am

Philanthropy Australia warns that a Private Members Bill to require religious and charitable institutions to meet a public benefit test to justify their exemption from taxation may have the potential for enormous “collateral damage” in the Not for Profit sector.

The Tax Laws Amendment Bill (Public Benefit Test) was introduced by independent Senator Nick Xenaphon in May 2010 and is now being considered in a Senate Economics Legislation Committee hearing.

In his second reading speech to Parliament, Senator Xenaphon says the Bill is prompted by the heartbreaking stories he has heard from victims of the Church of Scientology and that the organisation’s tax-exempt status needs to be examined.

He says Scientology needs to be open and transparent, and to prove that the good they do in the community outweighs the harm.

Philanthropy Australia's CEO, Gina Anderson says the Bill could result in further administrative burdens placed on an already financially strained sector to prove public benefit, potentially on an annual basis, in order to retain their tax concessions.

Anderson says the result will also add an administrative and resource cost to the Australian Taxation Office with the potential cost of an appeal mechanism for disallowed charities which may pass into the Court system.

In a letter to the Senate hearing, Gina Anderson says redefining what constitutes charity and how this definition fits with the overall Not for Profit sector, is a complex issue which over the past decade has been the subject of much debate and two lengthy and complex Government inquiries; the Inquiry into the Definition of Charities and Related Organisations (2001) and more recently the Productivity Commission Report into the Contribution of the Not-for-Profit Sector (2010).

Anderson says this is proof that the redefinition of charity is an issue which needs to be addressed as a whole, rather than piecemeal.

Philanthropy Australia has called on the Federal Government to adopt a statutory definition of 'charitable purposes' and to take up the recommendations of the Productivity Commission.

Anderson says rather than taking a blunt instrument to these issues in the form of the Private Members Bill to test the tax status of a couple of organisations, the Productivity Commission has already done the work after wide consultation.

Anderson says Philanthropy Australia would be happy to address the Senate Committee.

In his second reading Speech, Nick Xenaphon says the public benefit test is not limited to the Church of Scientology. Under this legislation, he says all religious or charitable organisations will have to come clean about what they do—both the good and the bad.

more at http://www.probonoaustralia.com.au/news/2010/06/public-benefit-test-potentially-damaging

[mefree]

ABC 19 July 2010
Bad religion
by Lucy Saunders

...Freedom of religion means that people are free to believe in any or all of these things, and participate in these organisations as they choose. The real question is whether ordinary taxpayers should be required to subsidise this participation without any guarantee of a broader public benefit, which is the practical effect of the tax exemption. Xenophon's public benefit test will mean that religious organisations will be assessed on the merits of the tangible benefits they provide - not a huge hurdle for the majority of churches.

Further, a public benefit test means that when the government is debating whether Scientology or Seventh Day Adventists should receive a tax exemption, the question will no longer be 'is it a religion'. The idea of a government deciding what is and isn't a valid religion seems inconsistent with the separation of church and state. Under this system, I would still be free to travel the country spreading the light of the Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster - I just have to pay tax on any money I con out of people on the way, which seems fair.

The amendment will also make sure the separation of church and state cuts both ways. Some churches like to have their cake and eat it too - an example is the Exclusive Bretheren, a sect that has gone as far as to fund political advertisements, and is widely held to have exercised an enormous degree of influence over the Howard government. They seem strangely opinionated for a group that doesn't allow its members to vote. This kind of political activism from a religious group is not the kind of thing the public purse should be subsidising.

Xenophon's amendment may have been intended as a back-door route to getting at Scientology after his calls for a public inquiry failed, but its broader implications are of potentially great benefit to Australian society. With an atheist PM and all-time low numbers of Australians active in religion, it seems that this is an appropriate time to address a lingering inconsistency in our tax laws.

All hail the Spaghetti Monster!

more at http://www.abc.net.au/unleashed/stories/s2955597.htm