The Tax Information Authority (Amendment) Bill, 2008

The Tax Information Authority (Amendment) Bill, 2008 (the ‘Bill’) creates mechanisms which allow Cayman's Tax Information Authority (the ‘Authority’) to provide tax information to approved jurisdictions in accordance with international co-operation protocols in certain taxation matters. These mechanisms are intended to run parallel to the bilateral treaties envisaged by the current Tax Information Authority Law, 2005 (the ‘Law’). The Bill provides for the expansion of the Authority's powers allowing it to respond to requests from certain countries for information relating to the administration and enforcement of the tax laws of that country. The Authority has limited grounds to refuse a request from an approved country, being (i) where the request does not conform to the mechanism set out in the Bill; (ii) where the country has not pursued all means available in its territory to obtain the information (except where the means would give rise to disproportionate difficulty); or (iii) where the disclosure of the information would be contrary to public policy. If the Authority approves the request, the information is to be kept confidential and disclosed only to persons or authorities officially concerned with the information for tax purposes.