Phillip Murray Smiles (born 25 May 1946) is a former

Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a sovereign country comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands. With an area of , Australia is the largest country by ...

n politician. He was a Liberal member of the

New South Wales Legislative Assembly The New South Wales Legislative Assembly is the lower of the two houses of the Parliament of New South Wales, an Australian state. The upper house is the New South Wales Legislative Council. Both the Assembly and Council sit at Parliament Ho ...

, representing

Mosman Mosman is a suburb on the Lower North Shore region of Sydney, in the state of New South Wales, Australia. Mosman is located 8 kilometres north-east of the Sydney central business district and is the administrative centre for the local governm ...

from 1984 to 1991 and North Shore from 1991 to 1993.

Early life

Smiles was born in

, and attended local public schools. He then studied at the

University of Sydney The University of Sydney (USYD), also known as Sydney University, or informally Sydney Uni, is a public research university located in Sydney, Australia. Founded in 1850, it is the oldest university in Australia and is one of the country's si ...

, where he received a

Bachelor of Law Bachelor of Laws ( la, Legum Baccalaureus; LL.B.) is an undergraduate law degree in the United Kingdom and most common law jurisdictions. Bachelor of Laws is also the name of the law degree awarded by universities in the People's Republic of Ch ...

and a

Bachelor of Economics The Bachelor of Economics (BEc or BEcon), or the "Bachelor of Applied Economics", is a bachelor's degree awarded by many universities and colleges for completion of an undergraduate program in economics, econometrics, or applied economics; th ...

; at the

University of New South Wales The University of New South Wales (UNSW), also known as UNSW Sydney, is a public research university based in Sydney, New South Wales, Australia. It is one of the founding members of Group of Eight, a coalition of Australian research-intensiv ...

, where he received a

Master of Business Administration A Master of Business Administration (MBA; also Master's in Business Administration) is a postgraduate degree focused on business administration. The core courses in an MBA program cover various areas of business administration such as accounti ...

, and

Sydney Teachers College The Sydney Teachers' College was a tertiary education institution that trained school teachers in Sydney, Australia. It existed from 1906 until the end of 1981, when it became the Sydney Institute of Education, a part of the new Sydney College o ...

, where he received a

Diploma of Education The Diploma of Education, often abbreviated to DipEd or GradDipEd, is a postgraduate qualification offered in many Commonwealth countries including Australia, Sri Lanka, New Zealand, and the United Kingdom. Overview The diploma can build on the g ...

. He was employed as a marketing and management consultant before entering parliament.

Political career

In 1984, the state member for the safe Liberal seat of

, David Arblaster, retired. Smiles contested the preselection but was opposed by the local mayor, Dom Lopez. Smiles was successful, and went on to defeat Lopez (running as an

independent Independent or Independents may refer to: Arts, entertainment, and media Artist groups * Independents (artist group), a group of modernist painters based in the New Hope, Pennsylvania, area of the United States during the early 1930s * Independe ...

) in the election. In 1991, his seat was abolished, and he contested North Shore and defeated the

Independent Independent or Independents may refer to: Arts, entertainment, and media Artist groups * Independents (artist group), a group of modernist painters based in the New Hope, Pennsylvania, area of the United States during the early 1930s * Independe ...

member,

Robyn Read Robyn Read is a former Australian politician. She was the Independent member for North Shore in the New South Wales Legislative Assembly from 1988 to 1991. Read was born in St Leonards, the daughter of Norman Read and Edith Gordon. She was ...

. He became the first Liberal to represent North Shore; it had been held by independents since its creation even though it had originally been created as an ultra-safe Liberal seat. He was briefly Assistant Treasurer from 1991 to 1992. However, his career imploded after he tried to claim his

nannies A nanny is a person who provides child care. Typically, this care is given within the children's family setting. Throughout history, nannies were usually servants in large households and reported directly to the lady of the house. Today, modern ...

as a tax deduction. He claimed that his nannies did secretarial work for him, but they testified under oath that they had done nothing of the sort. In 1993, he was convicted of

tax evasion Tax evasion is an illegal attempt to defeat the imposition of taxes by individuals, corporations, trusts, and others. Tax evasion often entails the deliberate misrepresentation of the taxpayer's affairs to the tax authorities to reduce the tax ...

and fined $30,000 in what was dubbed the "Nannygate" case in the Australian press. As a result, he was forced to resign from parliament. He was investigated by the New South Wales parliament. Smiles was acquitted on appeal, but the court did not find him innocent and thus refused to order the Tax Office to foot his legal bills. Smiles then sued his accountant, Ted Moon, claiming that Moon's advice had led him to try to claim his nannies as a deduction. In 2003, the Supreme Court not only found in Moon's favour, but ordered Smiles to pay Moon's legal costs of close to $700,000. On 6 June 2005, registrar Sue McIllhatton declared him bankrupt, in part because he hadn't paid Moon a single cent of what he was owed.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Smiles, Phillip 1946 births Living people Liberal Party of Australia members of the Parliament of New South Wales Members of the New South Wales Legislative Assembly