Working in uk while living in aus info please

I been in australia for almost 4 yrs and its been a roller coaster ride regarding work.

In almost a yr for example i have done only 3 weeks work which is crazy.

Before i moved to aus i was always in work and for 23 yrs.

Ok things are not the best at the moment but i said to wife i just might need to get some work from uk for a bit and just travel back and forth each trip or leave i get.

I would be doing either 2 weeks work,2 weeks off or it might be same but 3/3.

I have my citizenship but wife still to apply for hers in june then we need to consider where we want to be.

This job in uk is 12 months work or even much longer.

My question is has anyone lived here but worked in uk?

If so whats the ins and outs of doing this ie paying tax?

Do you pay uk tax as well as aus tax.

Is it worth working in uk while staying in oz?

We are on family benefits a and b and its on my name would this need to be changed to wifes name if we still qualified.

Being a uk citizen there is no restrictions right in working even though aus is home at present.

Im trying to weigh up the pros and cons of working back there and what i should know.

I may not even get the work but uk work has never really been and issue in past.

But just wanted to know any helpful info you could pass on if i was offered this work.

Thanks

There is a agreement between Oz and UK for tax, so you would not get taxed twice, but I would speak to a good accountant about whether it would be best to pay in which country.

However, not sure of your plan, flights are expensive and that will eat up a lot of income. At the same time, I used to FIFO long haul - about the same flight as to the UK and it is exhausting. You end up spending a lot of your break just recovering and that was flying business or first class

With the distances involved, 14/14 would be a really tough gig - 21/21 might just be 'doable'.

You don't need me to tell you that its at least 24 hours flying each way, so 21on/21off would really be 21on/19off - and that's not including any recovery/jet lag time: you'll need that even if you're travelling business class.

It can be a stressy lifestyle if you've never done it before, with a likelihood of missing key family dates/holidays- but..needs must. Good luck to you if you can make it work.

On a possibly positive note, if you can make it work, and you can somehow separate yourself (tax wise) from your family in Australia and tie yourself to the UK for tax purposes, then you won't pay any tax if you can arrange to be in the UK for less than 90 days each year. That's the simple version - it can be more complicated, but its worth looking into. I'm not sure what the Australian tax authorities might make of that though, especially if you turn up every 3 weeks to visit your family

On a possibly positive note, if you can make it work, and you can somehow separate yourself (tax wise) from your family in Australia and tie yourself to the UK for tax purposes, then you won't pay any tax if you can arrange to be in the UK for less than 90 days each year. That's the simple version - it can be more complicated, but its worth looking into. I'm not sure what the Australian tax authorities might make of that though, especially if you turn up every 3 weeks to visit your family

If you're turning up to visit your family every 3 weeks there's no way the ATO are going to buy that you've ceased to be a resident - you need to show a very clear break from Australia to do that. Consequently you'll be paying Australia tax minus whatever tax you pay in the UK (so I wouldn't stress too much about trying to avoid UK tax by getting under the 90 day rule as you'll only be moving the tax bill from one jurisdiction to another). See if you can get your employer to pay for the flights for you (ATO is likely to consider them the cost of your commute - which is not tax deductible - but it's much easier to justify expenses that the employer has paid even where there's an argument that they should be treated as benefits in kind).