The Chief Justice of the Federal Court of Australia has recently announced that the Court has established a "tax list". This is a result of the Commissioner of Taxation advising the Court that a large number of objections (possibly as many as 40,000) lodged by tax-payers are likely to be disallowed over the course of the next year.
Many of these objections are likely to relate to aggressive tax schemes (some of which involve arrangements in respect of which the Commissioner had previously given favourable private tax rulings).
The Court has nominated a "tax list judge" for each capital city.
In practice, this will mean that taxation appeals will be referred to the tax list judge, who will determine whether the appeal relates only to the circumstances of a particular tax-payer, or alternatively, relates to a scheme affecting numerous tax-payers.
Cases relating to the circumstances of a particular tax-payer will be heard in the ordinary manner.
Where, however, a tax scheme is involved and there are many similar appeals, the Court will treat the appeal as a "special" case and will select "suitable test cases" to proceed to a hearing ahead of the other cases said to involve a similar scheme.