Meet Kimberley Barnes

Kimberley is a Special Counsel in the Business Advisory Team at Bennett & Philp Lawyers.

Kimberley advises a range of clients, including individuals, families and business owners to help them manage personal and business concerns and plan for the future with confidence, in a practical, commercial and sensible manner that achieves the client’s objectives.

Kimberley has experience assisting clients across a broad range of succession and estate planning matters, including implementing strategies to facilitate the transfer of wealth and assets during a person’s lifetime and managing the succession of complex groups and family dynamics. This includes providing advice and guidance on documenting bespoke succession arrangements, including bespoke trusts, governance provisions and family constitutions. Kimberley has strong experience in dealing with all matters relating to trusts, companies, partnerships and self-managed superannuation funds in a tax effective manner.

Kimberley also provides advice, guidance and recommendations on taxation issues that arise from deceased estates, including capital gains tax, foreign executors or beneficiaries and tax consequences on the distribution of assets.

Kimberley also provides advice on a range of tax matters, including federal and state taxes and superannuation. This advice extends to assisting individuals, trusts and companies in dealing with any reviews, audits, voluntary disclosure, early engagement and private rulings with the Australian Taxation Office and State Revenue Offices.

Kimberley provides advice and assistance to clients in relation to their structures, including trust variations, change of trustees, passing control of trusts and general trust advice. Kimberley has experience in dealing with discretionary trusts, bare trusts, fixed trusts, unit trusts, special trusts for NSW land tax purposes, charitable trusts and superannuation funds.

Kimberley can advise clients on the best structuring option to acquire assets or businesses, in an ever-changing landscape, and provides both tax advice and implementation in restructuring assets and businesses. Kimberley also assists clients in ensuring their wealth and assets are protected.

Kimberley’s expertise in succession, structuring, restructuring and taxation matters means that she is uniquely able to deliver practical and relevant solutions to clients to deal with their business and personal succession and structuring through every stage of life.

Recent highlights include:

• preparing a voluntary disclosure for a deceased estate that was no longer eligible for the NSW primary production land tax exemption, resulting in the full remission of penalties and interest
• preparing an objection to Part VII penalties for superannuation, resulting in the full remission of penalties
• provision of tax advice in relation to the application of the main residence CGT exemption on the transfer of property held by an executor for 15 years
• providing duty advice to financial planners and finance businesses in restructuring from a trust to company, resulting in significant duty savings
• successful objection to a private ruling that land sold was a mere realisation of a capital asset and not in the carrying on of business of property development
• provision of advice to executors on whether the sale of land with development approval amounts to a mere realisation of a capital asset or an isolated profit-making undertaking