Businesswoman and actress Marilynne Paspaley, of the famous pearling dynasty, once gave a public speech declaring: “I’m a Territorian, and more precisely, a Darwinite.”
Those words have come back to haunt her, as she recently lost a bid to avoid paying tax on a $6.5 million luxury home in Sydney’s Darling Point.
Ms Paspaley had argued that she was exempt from paying land tax on the five-bedroom, four-bathroom home on New Beach Road because it was her principal place of residence.
NSW land owners have to pay tax on properties valued over a certain amount, but tax is not applied to a principal place of residence, broadly understood as the place where someone “eats, drinks and sleeps”.
An investigation by the Chief Commissioner of State Revenue found that Ms Paspaley should pay land tax on the Sydney house for the years 2008 to 2012 because she spent the majority of her time living at two different properties in the Northern Territory, where she worked developing hotels. Ms Paspaley objected and took the matter to the Civil and Administrative Tribunal.
Ms Paspaley, also known for playing Dr Tessa Korkidas on the ABC show GP in the 1990s, gave evidence about where her valuable items were kept, where her family spent their Christmases, where she celebrated her 60th birthday and where her bills were sent, in order to prove the Sydney house was where she spent most of her time.