Article Author –  Susan Barker, director of Sue Barker Charities Law*

(This article also appears in Taxation Today Issue 81.)

On 12 December 2014, Dobson J delivered his decision in National Council of Women of New Zealand Inc v Charities Registration Board [2014] NZHC 3200, (2014) 26 NZTC 21-116. His Honour held that the National Council of Women of New Zealand Inc (“the Council”) should have its registration as a charity backdated to 22 July 2010, the date that it had been de-registered by the Charities Commission.

This decision brought to a close a battle for charitable registration under the Charities Act 2005 (“the Charities Act”) that had lasted more than six and a half years.

Background

As Dobson J noted, the National Council of Women has a “long and proud history”.[1] It was originally established in 1896 with Kate Sheppard, who had led the campaign for women’s suffrage, as its first President.

The Council’s broad purpose is to serve women, the family and the community at the local, national and international level. The Council, along with 69 other National Councils of Women around the world, is affiliated to the International Council of Women. Affidavit evidence was given that National Councils of Women around the world are registered as charities or their equivalent.

In New Zealand, the Council had always been considered by the Commissioner of Inland Revenue (“the Commissioner”) to be exempt from income tax under the charitable income tax exemptions (currently contained in ss CW 41 and CW 42 of the Income Tax Act 2007 (“the Income Tax Act”)).

Under the new regime for the regulation of charities established by the Charities Act, the Council applied for registration in May 2008 and was registered as a charity in June 2009. However, in July 2010, the Council was controversially de-registered by the Charities Commission (as it was then) on the basis of the Council’s work advocating for its charitable purposes. Despite acknowledging that the Council’s purposes were charitable, and despite the fact that all of the Council’s advocacy was undertaken in furtherance of its acknowledged charitable purposes, the Charities Commission considered that some of the Council’s advocacy “activities” (such as making submissions on Parliamentary Bills and otherwise participating in the democratic process) constituted a “political purpose” that was not charitable. It de-registered the Council on that basis. Ironically, the Council was contracted by Government to do the very work impugned.

Sometime later, in September 2012, the Council made a new application for registered charitable status. This application was granted in April 2013.

Significantly, nothing about the Council’s purposes, activities or rules, or the applicable law, had materially changed in the intervening period. All that had changed was the charities regulator’s jurisprudential view of the definition of charitable purpose as it applied to the Council.

The Council had asked the charities regulator, in the event that its second application for registration was successful, for its re-registration to be backdated to 19 August 2010, which was the effective date of the de-registration decision under s 20(2)(b) of the Charities Act.[2] This would have allowed the Council to have continuous registration coverage for tax purposes, and would have put it beyond doubt that it remained exempt from income tax as a charity throughout the period of de-registration. However, the charities regulator refused. Instead, the charities regulator backdated the Council’s re-registration to September 2012, the date of the second application. This meant that the Council faced a period from August 2010 to September 2012 when it was not registered as a charity.

Inland Revenue then sought to impose income tax on the Council for the period of de-registration. As a result, the Council had to file income tax returns, for the first time in over 100 years, for the three tax years involved in the de-registration period: 2011, 2012 and 2013. As the Council is a membership organisation, filing income tax returns required the seeking of specialist tax and accounting advice as to, among other things, how the mutual association provisions of the income tax legislation would apply to the Council. Having done so, the Council duly paid the income tax involved, but it did so without prejudice to its position that it remained legally exempt from income tax throughout the de-registration period as a “tax charity” under s CW 41(5)(b) of the Income Tax Act.

The decision to de-register the Council had a significant detrimental impact, and brought a strong and proud organisation of almost 120 years’ standing to the brink of closure. Most charities that are denied registration struggle to survive: they struggle to challenge decisions of the regulator in the framework as it is currently structured; they struggle to gain funding as busy funders rightly or wrongly restrict funding to registered charities only; and they struggle with issues of confidence and credibility, as the reasons for having been rejected by their own regulator are difficult to communicate to their stakeholders. Many are even forced to close.

Even though the Council was subsequently re-registered, the Council was forced to endure years of uncertainty and expense for no apparent reason.

The Council brought this case against both the charities regulator and Inland Revenue in the hope of clarifying the law not only for it, but for any other charities that may be affected by the approach to regulation that has been taken under the new Charities Act regime.

The tax provisions of the Charities Act regime

As discussed above, the Charities Act ushered in a new regime for the regulation of charities in New Zealand approximately 10 years ago, in 2005. The New Zealand charitable sector had fought for many years to see a Charities Commission established, so that “bad” charities (eg, those involved in fraud, or tax avoidance, or money laundering, etc) could be “weeded out” and the public could have trust and confidence in those that remained.[3]

The original Charities Act proposed to amend the income tax legislation to require a charity to be registered with the Charities Commission in order to qualify for the charitable income tax exemptions.[4] This requirement was scheduled to come into force on 1 July 2008.[5] The charities register opened in February 2007, and charities therefore had until 1 July 2008 to gain registration with the charities regulator in order to preserve their exemption from income tax.

However, by October 2007, a huge backlog of applications for registration had accumulated. Concern began to mount that the Charities Commission would not be able to process all the applications for registration before the 1 July 2008 deadline.[6]

The concern became so great that, on 22 May 2008, the Government introduced remedial legislation designed to give “tax certainty” to charities in the lead-up to the 1 July 2008 deadline.[7] The Taxation (Personal Tax Cuts, Annual Rates, and Remedial Matters) Act 2008, which was passed into law seven days later on 29 May 2008, amended the income tax legislation to replace the requirement to be registered with a requirement to be a “tax charity”, as defined, in order to qualify for the charitable income tax exemptions.[8]

The new definition of “tax charity” was inserted as s CW 41(5) of the Income Tax Act. This definition retained the requirement to be registered as a charity in order to access the charitable income tax exemptions (s CW 41(5)(a)). A new transitional provision was also inserted (s CW 41(5)(b)), which allowed unregistered charities to remain exempt from income tax under the charitable income tax exemptions, on transition to the new Charities Act regime, “provided they can prove that they started the application process before 1 July [2008] and that they intend to complete it”.[9] Inland Revenue had proposed the transitional provision because it was concerned about “how it would deal with charities that had not completed the registration process by the [1 July 2008] deadline”.[10]

As the then Minister of Revenue, Hon Peter Dunne, noted on the first reading of the Bill:[11]

We do not want to see a situation where organisations that have submitted their applications in good faith, and that, for reasons beyond their control, find that the registration process has not been completed by 1 July [2008], then discover that their tax-exempt status is at risk.

As discussed above, the National Council of Women duly applied for registered charitable status in May 2008. However, by May 2009, a year later, it had still not received a decision on its application. Around this time, charities were needing to finalise their financial statements for the tax year ended 31 March 2009. Charities affected by the backlog faced uncertainty as to whether they would be registered by the Charities Commission and therefore whether they would have to account for income tax in their financial statements.

All of this led to the Charities Commission receiving significant pressure to reduce the backlog of applications for registration.[12]

By May and June 2009, it appears that the Charities Commission may have responded to that pressure by simply registering large numbers of charities but identifying them for subsequent investigation.[13]

The Council was one of those charities. The Council was registered as a charity by the Charities Commission on 5 June 2009, with registration backdated to 30 June 2008, the day before the relevant tax provisions came into effect. However, the Charities Commission identified the Council for subsequent investigation at that time. The Charities Commission then commenced that investigation into the Council only a few weeks later, in September 2009.

Following that investigation, on 16 April 2010, the Charities Commission sent the Council a notice of intention to remove the Council from the charities register on the basis of its work advocating for its charitable purposes. The Charities Commission then proceeded to de-register the Council on 22 July 2010, with effect from 19 August 2010.

The de-registration of the Council was controversial. There was shock and disbelief that a good charity of over a century’s standing could come to be de-registered, particularly for doing the very work it was contracted by the Government to do.

Charities’ access to justice

Under the Charities Act, the only mechanism for appealing a decision of the charities regulator is to file proceedings in the High Court (s 59). Such an appeal has to be filed within 20 working days of the date of the decision (even if the charity does not actually receive the decision until several days later). This is an extremely short timeframe for a modestly-resourced charity, run by a board of volunteers, to absorb a lengthy legal decision, make a decision to commence proceedings in the High Court, ensure it was able to fund the cost of doing so, and find and instruct a lawyer.

At that time, the Council did not have the benefit of legal advice and felt that it could not realistically appeal the de-registration decision.

Under s 59(2)(b) of the Charities Act, a charity may apply to the High Court for an extension of time to file High Court proceedings. By April 2012, the Council had consulted with and instructed a lawyer, and made the decision to challenge the de-registration decision. The Council approached the charities regulator to ask if they would support an application under s 59(2)(b) of the Charities Act for leave to appeal the de-registration decision out of time. However, the charities regulator refused.

As an application for leave to appeal the de-registration decision out of time was clearly going to be opposed, exposing the Council to significant additional uncertainty and cost, the Council felt that its only practical option for seeking to have the de-registration decision overturned was to file a new application for registered charitable status. This it duly did on 10 September 2012.

Because appeals under the Charities Act are currently being interpreted as “appeals on the record”, charities have no automatic right to present evidence in Court unless that evidence was presented to the charities regulator before it made its decision. (It does not appear to be widely appreciated that charities’ ability to have an oral hearing of evidence has, in fact, effectively been removed altogether.)[14] In order to make sure it would be able to adduce in Court the evidence it needed to prove that its purposes were indeed charitable, the Council provided evidence in support of its second application for registration as if it were preparing for a High Court trial. The application took a significant amount of work to prepare, and the accompanying information had to be carried in to the charities regulator in a box. The Council fully expected that it would have to defend its application in the High Court.

However, the Council’s application was accepted and, on 15 April 2013, the Council was restored to the charities register albeit under a new registration number (CC 49050) with re-registration backdated to 10 September 2012.

The effective date appeal

The original Charities Bill was substantially rewritten at Select Committee stage in response to hundreds of submissions.[15] One of the changes made at Select Committee stage was to give the charities regulator a specific power to backdate the effective time of registration. The Select Committee made the following comments (emphasis added):[16]

[The power to backdate the effective time of registration] should ensure that entities are not disadvantaged by any delays in processing a valid application. In making this recommendation, the majority wishes nevertheless to emphasise the importance of ensuring that registration applications are processed in an efficient and timely manner. We recognise that the [Charities Commission] will receive a significant number of applications in its initial period of operation, and that some delays will naturally arise as a consequence of this. However, in normal operating circumstances, we expect the application process to be smooth and quick.

This discretionary power is now contained in s 20 of the Charities Act, which provides as follows (emphasis added):

(1)  The Board may, if it thinks fit, direct the chief executive [of the Department of Internal Affairs] to register a notice in the register of charitable entities that specifies that an entity must be treated as having become registered as a charity at a time (the effective registration time) that is before the time at which the entity actually became registered as a charitable entity.

(2)  However, the effective registration time must not,—

(a)  in the case of a trust, society, or an institution referred to in section 73(1) of the Estate and Gift Duties Act 1968 created or established by a gift after the commencement of this section, be earlier than the time that the gift was made; and

(b)  in any other case, be earlier than the time that the chief executive received a properly completed application for registration of the entity as a charitable entity.

(3)  Before the Board exercises its powers under subsection (1), the Board must be satisfied that the entity was qualified for registration as a charitable entity at all times during the period between the effective registration time and the time at which the entity actually became registered as a charitable entity.

(4)  If the Board exercises its powers under subsection (1) in relation to an entity, the entity must be treated as having become registered as a charitable entity at the effective registration time for the purposes of this Act, the Income Tax Act 2007, and the Estate and Gift Duties Act 1968.

Under s 20(2)(b) of the Charities Act, the charities regulator may backdate registration to the date of “a” properly completed application. The provision does not specify “which” properly completed application.

The Council filed its original properly completed application for registration on 29 May 2008. The Council argued that the Charities Board could therefore have exercised its discretion under s 20(2)(b) of the Charities Act to re-register the Council with effect from 19 August 2010. Doing so would have allowed the Council to retain continuous registration for income tax purposes, which would have removed any potential exposure to income tax for the Council for the de-registration period.

The Council also argued that it qualified for registration at all times throughout the period of de-registration and that s 20(3) was satisfied: the Council was now a registered charity and nothing had materially changed. Further, no harm would be caused by allowing the re-registration of the Council, an acknowledged charity, to be backdated.

However, as discussed above, the charities regulator refused to backdate the Council’s re-registration to a date earlier than 10 September 2012. The Council accordingly appealed that decision by filing proceedings in the High Court, as required by s 59 of the Charities Act. This appeal is referred to below as the “effective date appeal”.

The tax challenge

Separately, the Council argued that it had not in fact become liable for income tax on de-registration because it had remained a “tax charity” under s CW 41(5)(b) of the Income Tax Act throughout the period of de-registration.

Section CW 41(5) relevantly provides as follows:[17]

In this section … tax charity means,—

(a)  a trustee or trustees of a trust, a society, or an institution, registered as a charitable entity under the Charities Act 2005:

(b)  a trustee or trustee of a trust, a society, or an institution (the entity) that—

(i)  has started, before 1 July 2008, to take reasonable steps in the process of preparing an application for registering the entity as a charitable entity under the Charities Act 2005; and

(ii)  intends to complete the process of preparing an application described in subparagraph (i); and

(iii) has not been notified by the Commissioner that the entity is not a tax charity: …

The Council argued that it met all three limbs of paragraph (b):

• The Council had started, before 1 July 2008, to take reasonable steps in the process of preparing an application for registration as a charitable entity under the Charities Act. In fact, the Council had submitted its fully completed application for registration as a charitable entity prior to that date, on 29 May 2008. The Commissioner’s guidelines stated that making an application for charitable registration before 1 July 2008 meets the requirements of s CW 41(5)(b)(i).[18]
• The Council fully intended to complete the process of preparing its application for registered charitable status.
• Although the Council had received a letter asking that it pay income tax, it had never been formally notified by the Commissioner that it was not a tax charity.

Accordingly, the Council argued that it met all three limbs of the definition of “tax charity” in s CW 41(5)(b) of the Income Tax Act, and was therefore exempt from income tax under s CW 41(1)(b) and (2) throughout the period of de-registration.

The difficulty was that the Council had been registered in June 2009. At that point, it had become exempt from income tax as a tax charity under s CW 41(5)(a). The Council argued that this did not preclude its status as a tax charity under the transitional provision of s CW 41(5)(b) from continuing to apply following its subsequent de-registration in July 2010. The Council argued that its original 29 May 2008 application had effectively only finally been determined in April 2013: the Council’s registration in June 2009 was not the Charities Commission’s final determination of the matter because it had identified the Council for investigation at that time. That investigation had led directly to the de-registration of the Council in July 2010. The Council had effectively appealed that de-registration decision, in the only practical way it could, by reapplying for registered charitable status in September 2012. Its eligibility for registered charitable status was therefore effectively only finally determined when that application had been determined in April 2013.

The Council argued that it was an example of a charity that “needed more time to complete the registration process” that it had begun in May 2008.[19] The delays in processing the Council’s 29 May 2008 application specifically arose out of the number of applications that needed to be processed at the commencement of the regime. These delays had been exacerbated by the narrow approach taken by the charities regulator to the definition of charitable purpose, particularly the words “for example advocacy”, which had been inserted into s 5(3) of the Charities Act at Select Committee stage. These words had led the charities regulator to adhere strictly to a “political purpose exclusion”, an interpretation which the Supreme Court has since held to be incorrect.[20] The Council argued it was precisely the type of charity the transitional provision was intended to support. It therefore met all the requirements of the definition of “tax charity”, as a matter of both form and substance, throughout the period of de-registration, despite registration in June 2009.

Accordingly, having filed income tax returns for the 2011, 2012 and 2013 tax years, the Council then filed notices of proposed adjustment against those returns. The Council proposed that those returns be adjusted to nil, to reflect the fact that it was in fact exempt from income tax for the period of de-registration under s CW 41(5)(b).

Donee status

The Commissioner rejected the Council’s notices of proposed adjustment and the Council and the Commissioner duly followed the initial parts of the statutory disputes process of the Tax Administration Act 1994. However, this did not resolve the dispute. Following a conference held in August 2013, the Council made a request to “opt out” of the remainder of the disputes process and have the dispute determined by a hearing authority.

It is significant that the Commissioner made her agreement to the Council’s request, to opt out of the remainder of the disputes process, conditional on the Council providing information about donations received during the de-registration period, and whether receipts were issued for those donations. The Commissioner required the Council to provide this information regarding donations despite the fact that:

• The issue in dispute was whether the income of the Council was exempt from income tax during the period of de-registration. Donations are not “income” for the purposes of the income tax legislation.[21] Accordingly, the issue of what donations were received during the period of de-registration was entirely irrelevant to any matter at issue.
• Charitable registration is not a prerequisite to donee status. In the Charities Bill as introduced, the Charities Commission was required to operate and maintain a register of approved donee organisations, in addition to the register of charitable entities.[22] However, this requirement was removed at Select Committee stage.[23] There is no requirement for an entity to be registered as a charity in order to be eligible for donee status. As a matter of law, donee status is available to societies whose funds are “applied wholly or mainly to charitable, benevolent, philanthropic, or cultural purposes within New Zealand”, whether or not registered as a charity.[24]
• The Council’s purposes are and have always been exclusively charitable, despite the de-registration decision. The Council’s purposes are likely benevolent and/or philanthropic as well. The Council met the requirements for donee status in s LD 3 of the Income Tax Act throughout the period of de-registration.
• Although, in a self-assessment environment, the Commissioner’s formal approval is not a prerequisite to donee status, the Council’s donee status was never in fact revoked. In fact, the Council had specifically sought the Commissioner’s confirmation that its donee status remained in force, and the Commissioner had twice confirmed in writing that the Council indeed had donee status (on 21 October 2010 and 20 April 2011).

Nevertheless, the Council duly provided the information requested regarding donations. The Commissioner then proceeded to issue a “tax challenge notice”, which allowed the Council to commence proceedings challenging the assessments that the Council was liable for income tax during the de-registration period. These proceedings are referred to below as the “tax challenge proceedings”.

The High Court was chosen as the forum for the tax challenge proceedings specifically so that they could be heard at the same time as the effective date appeal.

In a preliminary interlocutory matter, Clifford J ordered on 10 June 2014 that the tax challenge, to the extent that it involves the question of the interpretation of s CW 41(5)(b) of the Income Tax Act and the effective date appeal, should be heard at the same time as this would “promote the efficient use of everyone’s resources”.[25] His Honour held there is a “real public interest” in the Council, particularly given its status as a charity, limiting its exposure to the cost of two separate proceedings that “arise out of the same facts and circumstances, and that consider interpretational issues of two related provisions, albeit of separate pieces of legislation”.[26]

His Honour also granted the Council’s application for leave to adduce further evidence attesting to the impact of the de-registration decision. His Honour held that it would be of “assistance to the Court to understand the circumstances which provide the background to this appeal”.[27]

Against all of that background, the substantive hearing of the two sets of proceedings took place in the Wellington High Court before Dobson J on 26 and 27 November 2014.

Ahead in Part 2

In Part 2 to be published in Taxation Today Issue 82 we discuss Dobson J’s findings in the effective date appeal and the tax challenge, and consider the implications of the decision for charities.

*Sue Barker is the director of Sue Barker Charities Law, a boutique law firm based in Wellington specialising in charities law and public tax law. In November 2013, the firm was voted New Zealand’s boutique law firm of the year at the New Zealand Law Awards. Sue is also co-author of the text, The Law and Practice of Charities in New Zealand, published by LexisNexis in May 2013. Sue can be contacted at: susan.barker@charitieslaw.co; +64 (0) 21 790 953; or PO Box 3065, Wellington 6140.

Foot notes:

[1] National Council of Women of New Zealand Inc v Charities Registration Board [2014] NZHC 3200, (2014) 26 NZTC 21-116 at [10].

[2] Previously the Charities Commission and now the Department of Internal Affairs – Charities Services and the Charities Registration Board.

[3] See, for example, Inland Revenue Operational Statement OS 06/02: Interaction of tax and charities rules, covering tax exemption and donee status (TIB vol 18:11 (December 2006) at [3]); Charities Bill 2004 (108-1) at 1; (30 March 2004) 616 NZPD 12121; (12 April 2005) 625 NZPD 19952; Charities Bill 2004 (108-2) at 19‒21; S Barker, M Gousmett and K Lord The Law and Practice of Charities in New Zealand (LexisNexis, Wellington, 2013) at [4.11] to [4.16]; S Barker “The myth of charitable activities” [2014] NZLJ 304; and Mark von Dadelszen “Moving the charitable goal posts” NZLawyer (Issue 155, New Zealand, 11 March 2011).

[4] Charities Act 2005, ss 65‒67.

[5] Charities Act 2005, s 2 and Charities Act Commencement Order 2006.

[6] National Party “Charities Commission chokes on backlog” (press release, 12 October 2007).

[7] Inland Revenue Guide to the tax changes proposed in the Taxation (Personal Tax Cuts, Annual Rates, and Remedial Matters) Bill 2008 (22 May 2008) at 1.

[8] The Taxation (Personal Tax Cuts, Annual Rates, and Remedial Matters) Bill 2008 (213-1) was introduced on 22 May 2008 and received its second and third readings on the same day. The Bill received Royal Assent on 29 May 2008.

[9] (22 May 2008) 647 NZPD 16251.

[10] Inland Revenue Remedial amendments clarifying the rules for registration of charities (TIB vol 20:7 (August 2008) at 10) (emphasis added).

[11] Taxation (Personal Tax Cuts, Annual Rates, and Remedial Matters) Bill 2008 (213-1); (22 May 2008) 647 NZPD 16251.

[12] See National Party “Charities Commission chokes on backlog” (press release, 12 October 2007).

[13] See, for example, Office of the Auditor-General Financial Review briefing to the Social Services Committee: Charities Commission (16 December 2009) at 3:

The Commission did not achieve its target in 2008/09 to fully complete 20‒25% of applications for registration within 30 working days of receipt. The result was only 12% for the year as a whole, although the target was achieved in May and June 2009 once the backlog was cleared.

See also Charities Commission Social Services Select Committee Hearing – Written Questions (FR/CHC/3, 23 March 2009) at 4, 12, 15, 18 and 21.

[14] See Susan Barker “Appealing decisions of the charities regulator” (paper presented to the Auckland District Law Society Seminar, Auckland, 1 and 3 April 2014).

[15] See, for example, (12 April 2005) 625 NZPD 19944: “The committee received 753 submissions … there has been a virtual rewrite of the original bill.” See also Charities Bill 2004 (108-2) (select committee report) at 21:

It became obvious to the Committee during the hearing of submissions that the bill – as tabled – was fundamentally flawed. Further it is very disappointing that an open and robust consultation process over the considerable changes to the bill was not undertaken.

[16] Charities Bill 2004 (108-2) (select committee report) at 7.

[17] Income Tax Act 2007, s CW 41(5) was amended on 30 June 2014 by the Taxation (Annual Rates, Employee Allowances, and Remedial Matters) Act 2014, to add a new paragraph (d). It provides an income tax exemption for:

a person who is removed from the [charities] register, in the period starting with the day they are registered on the register and ending with the earlier of the following days:

(i) the day on which the person does not comply with the person’s rules contained in the register:

(ii) the day of final decision.

The “day of final decision” is defined in s YA 1 of the Income Tax Act 2007 to mean the later of:

(a) the day the relevant person is removed from the register of charitable entities under the Charities Act 2005:

(b) the day on which all reasonably contemplated administrative appeals and court proceedings, including appeal rights, are finalised or exhausted in relation to the person’s charitable status

These amendments apply from 14 April 2014, for the 2014-15 and subsequent income years, and for an income year before the 2014-15 income year, but only for the first income year and subsequent income years for which the person files a return of income on the basis that these subsections apply for the relevant income year: Taxation (Annual Rates, Employee Allowances, and Remedial Matters) Act 2014, s 30(4). It seems unlikely that these amendments would apply for the Council, because the Council was reregistered as a charity with effect from 10 September 2012, and because it had already filed income tax returns for 2011 and 2012 which were the subject of these proceedings.

[18] Inland Revenue Transitional guidelines for charities (7 August 2008) at 2.

[19] Inland Revenue Transitional guidelines for charities (7 August 2008) at 1; Inland Revenue Remedial amendments clarifying the rules for registration of charities (TIB vol 20:7 (August 2008) at 10).

[20] The Supreme Court in Re Greenpeace of New Zealand Inc [2014] NZSC 105, (2014) 26 NZTC 21-088 held that the charities regulator’s approach to s 5(3) of the Charities Act 2005 was unnecessarily rigid, and obscured proper focus on whether a purpose is of public benefit and charitable within the sense the law recognises as charitable (at [3], [69] and [70]). The Supreme Court also held that advocacy may well constitute in itself a public good (at [62]), and that advocacy for such ends as human rights may be charitable in themselves, depending on the nature of the advocacy (at [71]). This decision was handed down in August 2014, approximately 17 months after the Council had been reregistered.

[21] Unless they fall within the concept of “income under ordinary concepts” under s CA 1(1) of the Income Tax Act 2007, which would be unusual and was not suggested.

[22] Charities Bill 2004 (108-1) at 1, cls 33 to 44.

[23] Charities Bill 2004 (108-2) at 2‒3.

[24] Income Tax Act 2007, s LD 3(2)(a).

[25] National Council of Women of New Zealand Inc v Charities Registration Board [2014] NZHC 3200, (2014) 26 NZTC 21-116 at [44] and [45].

[26] National Council of Women of New Zealand Inc v Charities Registration Board [2014] NZHC 3200, (2014) 26 NZTC 21-116 at [43].

[27] National Council of Women of New Zealand Inc v Charities Registration Board [2014] NZHC 3200, (2014) 26 NZTC 21-116 at [29].