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Meeting of the GST Consultative
Forum on Health

Raymond Khoury January 2000

The first meeting of the GST Consultative Forum on Health was held on 25 January 2000 in Canberra.

The Consultative Forum's raison d'être is to provide an opportunity for the Australian Taxation Office (ATO) to discuss Health Sector practitioner issues related to the interpretation and clarification of the Goods and Services Tax (GST), with the aim of reaching conclusions on major issues prior to the introduction of the GST on 1 July 2000.

To achieve the Consultative Forum's objective, peak practitioner associations were invited to attend the meeting together with members from the ATO GST Health Technical segment and Health Department representatives.

The Chair explained that the Forum's task was to clarify GST issues in the health industry within the scope of the GST legislation. The issues that delegates raise will be entered in an issues log and when finalised the Log will be binding on the ATO. The Chair advised that the major issues will be finalised by end of March.

The next meeting will be held in February in Canberra.