Redesign of the Voluntary Tax Transparency Code

Background

The Voluntary Tax Transparency Code (VTTC) is a set of principles and ‘minimum standards’. It helps entities disclose their tax information.

Australian and global tax transparency changed significantly since the VTTC’s development in 2016. The Board of Taxation followed developments for Significant Global Entities including:

  • public Country‑by‑Country (CbC) reporting in Australia
  • similar global tax transparency initiatives
  • wider environmental, social and governance (ESG) reporting.

The Board redesigned the VTTC in 2025. We updated and simplified it to achieve purposeful transparency.

The redesign complements and minimises duplication with the CbC reporting regime. It gives entities that aren’t public CbC reporters a way to report their tax affairs. This reduces reporting requirements for them.

Review

The Treasurer tasked the Board with reviewing the VTTC in August 2024. The review included how to:

  • supplement policy developments in global tax transparency
  • encourage best practice tax transparency reporting.

The Board set up a working group to undertake the review. We appointed members Andrew Mills and Andrea Laing to lead this work.

Phase 1 – Initial review

The Board ran targeted consultation from August to October 2024. Stakeholders included:

  • large business
  • professional and industry bodies
  • investor and finance groups
  • advisors
  • academics
  • civil society groups
  • government bodies.

We heard that the VTTC still helps to promote more tax transparency and community confidence in the tax system.

We concluded that the VTTC should be simplified and updated to:

  • minimise duplication with other tax transparency regimes
  • align with policy developments.

Phase 2 – Redesign

We started redesigning the VTTC in January 2025.

We consulted on a draft and a consultation guide with questions in June 2025. Stakeholders included:

  • VTTC participants
  • professional and industry bodies
  • investor and finance groups
  • advisors
  • academics
  • civil society groups
  • government bodies

We got feedback through:

  • virtual consultation sessions
  • written submissions
  • a short survey to find how many current participants plan to complete the redesigned VTTC.

We incorporated the valuable feedback whilst balancing competing interests. We would like to thank everyone that participated.

Submissions

The Board received 10 written submissions.

Submitter Download
Aware Super PDF 230 KB
Business Council of Australia PDF 68 KB
Chartered Accountants Australia and New Zealand PDF 197 KB
CPA Australia PDF 199 KB
Corporate Tax Association PDF 268 KB
Insignia Financial Ltd PDF 444 KB
KPMG Australia PDF 299 KB
Property Council PDF 156 KB
Queensland University of Technology and University of New South Wales PDF 130 KB
Tax Justice Network DOCX 57 KB

Key changes

Part of 2016 VTTC Changes in 2025 VTTC
Format, design and structure Updated and simplified
Objectives

Updated

New ‘Why adopt’ section

Guidance for new VTTC participants
Disclosure classification

Updated – there are different reporting requirements for a ‘public CbC reporter’ and a ‘non‑public CbC reporter’. Before it was based on the entity’s size and aggregated turnover.

Removed duplication for public CbC reporters.

Included more optional elements largely based on the Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) 207. They differ based on CbC reporter classification.
Part A – Qualitative information

Replaced with ‘Tax data’.

Added optional elements (largely based on the GRI 207).
Part B – Quantitative information

Replaced with ‘Overall approach to tax’.

Approach to tax aligned with:

  • GRI 207–2 – tax governance, control and risk management
  • GRI 207–3 – Stakeholder engagement and management of tax concerns.

Added optional elements.
Guidance

Added more guidance throughout including:

  • document navigation
  • guidance on completion timing
  • example template format of VTTC report based on fictitious ‘public CbC reporter’ and a ‘non‑public CbC reporter’ (Appendix A)
  • self‑assessment VTTC checklist (Appendix B)
  • glossary (Appendix C).

Roll out

The redesigned VTTC will start for the year beginning 1 July 2026. Early adoption is optional.

Entities that already reported on their 2026 financial year do not need to report again. This prevents duplication or confusion for participants with different reporting periods.

For more information, email the Board of Taxation Secretariat at taxboard@taxboard.gov.au