Costa Rica and the Special Administrative region of Macao, People's Republic of China, have become the latest jurisdictions to sign agreements with Australia to assist the Government in preventing offshore tax avoidance and evasion.

The Assistant Treasurer, the Hon Bill Shorten, today announced the signing of bilateral Tax Information Exchange Agreements (TIEA), with Costa Rica and Macao.

"There are now 30 jurisdictions that have signed such agreements with Australia, and the Gillard Government welcomes Costa Rica and Macao as TIEA partner jurisdictions," the Assistant Treasurer said.

The agreements provide a legal basis for Australia to exchange taxpayer information with each of the jurisdictions.

"The signing of the agreements demonstrates the commitment of these two jurisdictions to international tax standards. The need to tackle cross-border tax evasion has never been so important, so it is good to see Costa Rica and Macao working with Australia to address international tax evasion," the Assistant Treasurer said.

Tax evasion undermines the fairness of tax systems and costs governments, and honest taxpayers, billions of dollars every year. Australia is continually improving its network of exchange of information agreements, making it increasingly hard to avoid Australian tax.

"Securing these latest agreements further expands Australia's TIEA network, boosting transparency in both the domestic and global financial systems and helping prevent offshore tax avoidance and evasion," the Assistant Treasurer said.

The agreements will enter into force when the relevant domestic requirements have been completed in each of the jurisdictions.

Copies of the agreements can be found on the Treasury website www.treasury.gov.au

13 July 2011