The amount of transfer duty that is payable is calculated by determining the dutiable value and applying the appropriate rate of duty.
New Legislative Update
The Revenue Laws Amendment Bill 2018 (WA) received Royal Assent on 12 June 2019, and it has now come into effect in its entirety.
Landholder Duty
The ‘linked entity’ provisions in the landholder duty chapter have been expanded. New ‘look through’ rules now operate to link an entity to an unlisted entity where the first entity has a total (direct or indirect) interest of at least 50 per cent in the other entity.
Further, new aggregation provisions have commenced, whereby transactions or acquisitions that result from substantially one arrangement will be dutiable. Transactions will also be aggregated where two or more transactions result in the acquisition of interests in land with a value of $2M or more. A ‘one arrangement’ deeming provision has been introduced, whereby unless the Commissioner is satisfied otherwise, the following transactions are deemed to be part of one arrangement if they occur within 12 months:
- acquisitions in two or more entities by the same person; or
- a transfer of chattels and a landholder acquisition by the same person.
Duty will also apply to relevant acquisitions made between related persons. However, persons may be treated as unrelated where the acquisitions result from a public float (as defined) or other prescribed circumstances (no other circumstances have been prescribed so far).
Item Fixed to Land
The definition of ‘land’ has been expanded to include anything fixed to land regardless of whether the items are common law fixtures, or whether they are owned separately from the land.
Derivative Mining Rights
The transfer, grant or surrender of a derivative mining right is now dutiable. Broadly speaking, these are rights which arise when a person is authorised by the holder of a mining tenement (ie the holder of a prospecting licence, exploration licence or mining lease) to explore for and mine certain minerals on that tenement. As derivative mining rights will also be included as ‘land’ for the purposes of landholder duty, a transfer of shares in a company that owns derivative mining rights may now attract duty.