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International Handbook on Clinical Tax Education: Foreword

International Handbook on Clinical Tax Education
Foreword
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table of contents
  1. Title Page
  2. Copyright
  3. Contents
  4. List of figures
  5. List of tables
  6. List of appendices
  7. List of abbreviations
  8. Foreword
  9. 1. Introduction
  10. Part I. The tax clinic
    1. 2. A brief history of tax clinics around the globe
      1. 2.1 Key findings
      2. 2.2 Introduction
      3. 2.3 From humble beginnings
      4. 2.4 From east to west
      5. 2.5 From south to north
      6. 2.6 Conclusion
    2. 3. Project administration: how to set up a tax clinic
      1. 3.1 Key findings
      2. 3.2 Introduction
      3. 3.3 The foundations of a clinic
        1. Institutional and/or organisational support
        2. Costs and wider resources
        3. Supervision
        4. Insurance
        5. Data protection
      4. 3.4 Clinic design
        1. Student and supervisor recruitment
        2. Educational design
        3. Integration into community (client recruitment)
      5. 3.5 Concluding remarks
      6. 3.6 Key reading
    3. 4. Rationale: tax support for low-income individuals
      1. 4.1 Key findings
      2. 4.2 Introduction
      3. 4.3 Historical context
      4. 4.4 The tax charities – what they really do
        1. TaxAid
        2. Tax Help for Older People
        3. Tax clinics
      5. 4.5 The tax charities moving forward
      6. 4.6 Access to the tax charities
      7. 4.7 A rationale for low-income taxpayer support: common tax issues faced by those on a low income
        1. Non-tax issues
        2. Tax complexity
        3. Expansion of self-employment
        4. COVID-19
        5. Late registration and tax returns
        6. Other changes in how people are paid
        7. Incorrect PAYE codes
        8. Pension drawdown
        9. Proliferation of umbrella companies and disguised remuneration schemes
        10. Penalties
        11. Bankruptcy
        12. Digital exemption and assisted digital
        13. Working with HMRC to resolve generic tax issues
      8. 4.8 An international call to action
      9. 4.9 Concluding remarks
    4. 5. Rationale: tax and the poverty interface
      1. 5.1 Key findings
      2. 5.2 Introduction
      3. 5.3 Canvassing the tax and wider social issues addressed by the National Tax Clinic Program
        1. Tax and financial literacy
        2. The unmet need for tax advice in Australia
      4. 5.4 Introducing the UNSW Tax and Business Advisory Clinic
      5. 5.5 Benefit of tax clinics: Australia and internationally
        1. Opportunities for further research
      6. 5.6 Concluding remarks
  11. Part II. Tax clinics and our communities
    1. 6. Engagement in the community
      1. 6.1 Key findings
      2. 6.2 Introduction
      3. 6.3 The external stakeholders in CTE
        1. Supporting your local community
        2. Becoming part of the local community
      4. 6.4 Concluding remarks
    2. 7. Listening to our communities: the Community Tax Law Project as an example of a low-income taxpayer community-focused service provider
      1. 7.1 Key findings
      2. 7.2 Introduction
      3. 7.3 What does a community-focused tax clinic look like?
        1. Mission driven
        2. Community understanding and support
      4. 7.4 What populations are you going to serve?
        1. Demographic scope: how do your clients live, work, pray or play?
        2. Resources and limitations
        3. Learn from failures
      5. 7.4 What do these populations need or want?
      6. 7.5 What specifically does your clinic require to meet these needs and wants?
        1. Community partners: you cannot reach everyone by yourself
        2. Social capital: the who, what and when of building your clinic family
        3. Finances: the lights do not stay on with positive thoughts and well wishes
      7. 7.6 How do I fix the problem at the source? Yelling up the chain: advocacy as part of the clinic’s mission?
        1. Community advocacy
        2. Administrative advocacy
        3. Litigation as a venue for change
        4. Governmental advocacy
      8. 7.7 Conclusion
    3. 8. Public education: the Tax Club UNILAG
      1. 8.1 Key findings
      2. 8.2 The context of the Tax Club UNILAG
      3. 8.3 The creation of Tax Club UNILAG
      4. 8.4 An overview of the club’s activities
      5. 8.5 The importance of tax clubs
      6. 8.6 Some challenges faced by the tax club
      7. 8.7 Support for the use of tax clubs in education
      8. 8.8 Looking to the future
      9. 8.9 Concluding remarks
    4. 9. Public education: engaging with secondary education in schools
      1. 9.1 Key findings
      2. 9.2 Introduction
      3. 9.3 Tax clinics as defenders of taxpayer rights
      4. 9.4 Partnering with secondary education
        1. How the partnership was established
        2. Benefits of the community partnership
      5. 9.5 Conclusion
    5. 10. Taxpayer resolution: improving taxpayer compliance in Indonesia
      1. 10.1 Key findings
      2. 10.2 Introduction
      3. 10.3 Taxation in Indonesia in a nutshell
        1. Registration
        2. Bookkeeping
        3. Payment
        4. Reporting
        5. Audits and penalties
      4. 10.4 Revenue and taxpayer compliance
      5. 10.5 Improving individual taxpayer compliance
        1. The formation of the FoT community
        2. The development of FoT
      6. 10.6 Conclusion
    6. 11. Policy changes: impact on and through the Tax Court
      1. 11.1 Key findings
      2. 11.2 Introduction
      3. 11.3 Government approach
        1. Regulations and other rules
      4. 11.4 Role of tax clinics in shaping the law
        1. Litigation: impact of clinics on the community of low-income taxpayers
        2. Commenting on proposed legislation, regulations, forms and rules
        3. Commenting on systemic problems at the IRS
      5. 11.5 Conclusion
    7. 12. Marginalised voices: tax and the criminal justice system
      1. 12.1 Key findings
      2. 12.2 Introduction
      3. 12.3 Making Tax Digital
      4. 12.4 Digital exclusion
      5. 12.5 Tax issues – people in prison
        1. Digital exclusion – people in prison
        2. People in prison/with previous lived experience of prison as clinic clients
        3. Prison and self-employment
        4. Tax and self-employment
      6. 12.6 Student and university benefits
      7. 12.7 Conclusion
  12. Part III. Tax clinics and our students
    1. 13. Pedagogical theory and clinical tax education
      1. 13.1 Key findings
      2. 13.2 Introduction
      3. 13.3 Fostering the next generation of tax advisers: the importance of pro bono
      4. 13.4 Relevant pedagogical theories
        1. Employability from tax clinics: work-integrated learning (WIL)
        2. Growing student motivation and confidence: self-determination theory (SDT)
      5. 13.5 Concluding remarks
      6. 13.6 Key reading
    2. 14. Enhancing student experience: shadowing, role-plays and reflection
      1. 14.1 Key findings
      2. 14.2 Introduction: pedagogical rationale
      3. 14.3 Initial collaboration
      4. 14.4 Implementation
        1. Student recruitment
        2. EOI, CV and job interview
        3. Participation and presentation
      5. 14.5 From theory to practice
        1. Shadowing
        2. Team-based approach
        3. Role-plays
        4. Reflection and report writing
        5. Career readiness
        6. COVID-19 and the impact on the student experience
      6. 14.6 Conclusion
    3. 15. Introducing tax advocacy to students
      1. 15.1 Key findings
      2. 15.2 Introduction
      3. 15.3 The structure of a clinic course
        1. The seminar component
        2. The client representation component
      4. 15.4 Major design choices within the clinic model
        1. The directive–nondirective continuum
        2. Level of student responsibility for cases
        3. Use of examples and templates
        4. Case supervision
        5. Tension between client service and student educational development
      5. 15.5 Developing a reflective practice
        1. Exercising agency over one’s professional development
        2. Building the habit of reflection
      6. 15.6 Skills and direct advocacy experience
        1. Law firm management
        2. Ethics
        3. Multicultural lawyering
        4. Legal skills
          1. 1. Interviewing
          2. 2. Fact and legal investigation
          3. 3. Client advice and communication
          4. 4. Document drafting
        5. The advocacy mind-set
      7. 15.7 Working with community members
      8. 15.8 Conclusion
    4. 16. Developing employability skills through practice-based learning
      1. 16.1 Key findings
      2. 16.2 Introduction
      3. 16.3 Rationale for the TAC at UEL
        1. To raise awareness and provide free guidance in response to the COVID-19 lockdown
        2. To support employability of our accounting and finance students
      4. 16.4 Relevant literature
        1. Voluntary services: student, faculty and practitioner participation
        2. Pro bono: the participation of experienced practitioners
      5. 16.5 Clinic design
        1. Student volunteers
        2. Practice-led teaching
        3. External impact, collaborations and partnerships
        4. Student experience
        5. The challenges of tax and accounting clinics
      6. 16.6 Data and methodology
      7. 16.7 Results and discussion
        1. Tax and accountancy clinic and employability skills development
        2. The impact of COVID-19 on student TAC experience
        3. The measurement of students’ satisfaction: quality of the TAC training
      8. 16.8 Concluding remarks
    5. 17. Students’ professional identity and a fully online tax clinic
      1. 17.1 Key findings
      2. 17.2 Introduction
      3. 17.3 The Griffith Tax Clinic
        1. Face-to-face
        2. Online
      4. 17.4 Research methodology
        1. Participants
      5. 17.5 Data results
        1. Overall
        2. Nationality
        3. PWE (Professional Work Experience)
        4. Limitations of research and future research
      6. 17.6 Concluding remarks
  13. Part IV. Moving forwards
    1. 18. A research roadmap for tax clinics
      1. 18.1 Key findings
      2. 18.2 Introduction
      3. 18.3 Developing the tax clinic as a research project
      4. 18.4 Mapping the research field
      5. 18.5 Research methods
      6. 18.6 Theoretical perspectives
      7. 18.7 Concluding remarks
    2. 19. Moving forwards: tax clinics and business schools
      1. 19.1 Key findings
      2. 19.2 Introduction: the civic university
      3. 19.3 Widening participation
      4. 19.4 The challenge of professional accreditation
      5. 19.5 Practical experience
      6. 19.6 Some ideas for clinics going forwards
        1. Replacing High Volume Agents (HVAs)
        2. Child Trust Funds
        3. Cryptocurrencies
      7. 19.7 Policy clinics
        1. Desk research for the Office of Tax Simplification
        2. Educating policy makers
        3. Drawing on students’ experiences of the tax system
      8. 22.8 Concluding remarks
    3. 20. Concluding remarks
  14. Index

Foreword

Nina Olson, Executive Director of the Center for Taxpayer Rights*

In 1992, when I founded The Community Tax Law Project (CTLP), the first nonacademic low-income taxpayer clinic (LITC) in the United States, I thought the idea of providing both pro bono representation to low-income taxpayers and expanding volunteer opportunities for tax lawyers and other tax professionals would slowly come to be accepted in the tax community. At the time there were only a handful of tax clinics at law and accounting schools. It seemed to me that there was a natural fit for legal aid societies and other nongovernmental aid organizations who already served the low-income population to add tax controversy work to their service offerings. I hoped that the small tax clinic movement would eventually become national in scope.

But I certainly did not predict that tax clinics would expand at such a fast clip in the US and internationally. In the US, the LITC movement received the necessary boost of grant funding authorized in the United States Congress. What resonated with members of Congress from both parties was the plain truth that unrepresented taxpayers in tax disputes are at a fundamental disadvantage and often get the wrong result simply because they do not understand or meet the complex procedural requirements the tax agency establishes. Congress also grasped that case law developed in the federal courts was skewed toward taxpayers who could afford representation; a whole swath of issues affecting low- and middle-income taxpayers never received the benefit of judicial review, or if they did make it to court, again, the processes often determined a poor outcome. In all these instances, pro bono representation was essential to maintaining both the perception and reality of a fair and just tax system.

The LITC program immediately expanded in the first year funding was available, and has sustained a strong presence throughout the US, numbering over 120 clinics covering almost every state each year. However, the expansion was not limited to the US. In 2017, Annette Morgan came to visit the US with several of her students; in the course of their meeting with me to learn about the role of the National Taxpayer Advocate and the Taxpayer Advocate Service, we discussed the LITC program. Upon her return to Australia, Annette wasted no time in gathering support for establishing a tax clinic at Curtin University, and on my next visit to Australia, she arranged for us to meet with Australia Tax Office officials to gain their support for the program. The history of the tax clinic movement in Australia is recounted elsewhere in this volume, but suffice it to say that the programs continue to grow and evolve at a very impressive pace. Interest in establishing clinics is evidenced by the high attendance at the free annual online workshop offered each year by the Center for Taxpayer Rights, as part of the International Conference on Taxpayer Rights.

It is clear that tax clinics – either as an academic clinical program or as part of a portfolio of services offered by NGOs – are here to stay. The goal today is to expand the tax clinic’s reach to other countries, even as existing clinics strengthen their support in their communities and also add systemic advocacy, impact litigation and academic research to their current offerings. That is where this book comes in.

This volume is a treasure trove of information for anyone considering establishing a tax clinic. It acknowledges at the outset that given the diverse systems of taxation adopted by different countries, tax clinics will, of necessity, vary in terms of the populations they serve and the services they offer. For example, the US pulls tens of millions of low-income taxpayers into its income tax system via refundable credits that are social benefit programs run by the tax agency. Other tax systems include a value added tax or goods and services tax that can ensnare micro and small businesses. Although each clinic will decide its focus, this book, written by experienced clinicians from different backgrounds and different countries, provides a road map for how to start a clinic, establish relationships with tax agencies, publicize the clinic services and gain the trust of the targeted clientele, and find funding (not the least of one’s concerns).

But the editors and authors do not stop at the start-up considerations. The chapters on the pedagogy of clinical education, creating a curriculum and working with students are very thoughtful. The chapters nudging us to think beyond case-by-case representation and advice to undertake high-impact litigation, or commenting on rules and regulations, or filing amicus briefs in significant procedural cases, demonstrate that clinics can have a profound impact on the lives of all taxpayers, not just their immediate clients.

I, for one, am very grateful to the editors and authors for publishing this important work. It will certainly ease the path for clinics to come and will help ensure that the tax clinic movement does indeed become an international movement. The contributors to this book have charted a path for others who want to increase access to justice in their tax systems; only good can come from that.

Nina Olson

October 2022

  1. *Nina Olson is the Executive Director of the Center for Taxpayer Rights. She was the National Taxpayer Advocate at the US Internal Revenue Service from 2001 to 2019, where she oversaw the Low-Income Taxpayer Clinic (LITC) grant program. In 1992, she founded the first independent LITC in the US and her testimony before Congress in 1997–8 contributed to the enactment of federal funding for low income taxpayer clinics.

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