M&A Corporate Accountants Pty Ltd and Tax Practitioners Board

The Administrative Appeals Tribunal (AAT) considered an application by M&A Corporate Accountants Pty Ltd and another party (the applicants) for a stay of proceedings and confidentiality orders. The dispute concerned allegations of misconduct, particularly in relation to share dealings, brought by the Tax Practitioners Board. The applicants sought to prevent the proceedings from being conducted in the open, requesting orders for a conditional stay, that clients not be informed of the proceedings, and for confidentiality measures including pseudonyms and non-publication of orders.

The central legal issues before Deputy President McCabe were whether the Tribunal had the power to grant a conditional stay of proceedings, and whether the applicants had established grounds for confidentiality orders under sections 35 and 41 of the *Administrative Appeals Tribunal Act 1975* (Cth). Specifically, the Tribunal had to determine if the seriousness of the allegations warranted departing from the principle of open justice, and if there was a real possibility of injustice or serious injury to the applicants if the proceedings were not conducted privately.

Deputy President McCabe reasoned that while there may be exceptional circumstances where an open process could deter applicants from seeking review or producing evidence, this was not such a case. The applicants had not demonstrated that their privacy concerns, or the nature of the allegations, would lead to a reluctance to challenge the regulator or be open with evidence in a public forum. The Tribunal concluded that the applicants had failed to establish a real possibility of injustice or serious injury that would justify departing from the openness principle enshrined in section 35(5) of the Act. Consequently, the application for confidentiality orders was refused at that juncture.