The eminent jurist Learned Hand on the 1939 Internal Revenue Code: In my own case the words of such an act as the income tax, for example, merely dance before my eyes in a meaningless procession: cross-reference to cross-reference, exception…
Natural person ‘arguments’
Yet another ‘tax protester’ has been convicted of evasion in R v Porisky & Gould, 2012 BCSC 67. The judge described the natural person ‘argument’ as “a failed attempt at word magic validity” and “legal numerology”. That’s exactly right.
Partnership information return
A posting to the LinkedIn group “CDN Tax Cases and Tax Commentary” a few days ago alerted me to a post on the CRA website, which post contained the following gem: In February 2012, the CRA issued a revised version…
Relief?
I always hesitate to take a client’s money for a relief or fairness application because the CRA is usually pretty unsympathetic and the courts not much more helpful. In two relatively recent cases, the courts found that the CRA decision-making process in response to relief applications had been flawed, but the courts refused to provide a different result or order the Minister to reconsider the matter.
Labow appeal dismissed
The Federal Court of Appeal has dismissed the taxpayer’s appeal in Labow v R, 2011 FCA 305. The taxpayer had paid amounts to an offshore health and welfare trust for his wife`s benefit (she was an employee in his surgical…
“Employee” loans
In Rémillard v R, 2011 TCC 327, the Court spent some time considering whether an employee is required to include an amount in income in respect of a loan advanced to him by his corporate employer if the loan is not a “commercial debt obligation” as defined in subsection 80(1).
Gambling again
Mr. Giuseppe Tarascio is not having much luck convincing the tax courts that his gambling losses should be deductible from his income for tax purposes. See Tarascio v R, 2012 FCA 30, aff’g a decision of Associate Chief Justice Rossiter dismissing the taxpayer’s appeal.
Quotes
I’ve been quoted a couple of times recently in tax-related stories in The Lawyers Weekly, most recently in a story on Johnson v R, 2011 TCC 540, which I wrote about here.
Freeze share values
Bryan Walters has drawn my attention to an interesting CRA technical interpretation (2011-0404641C6 or CCH Window ¶10,832) in which the CRA states that the provisions of a shareholder agreement might reduce the value of freeze shares that otherwise have the “right” attributes for the purposes of a freeze (see “Freeze Shares“).
55(2)-land
I didn’t understand CRA technical interpretation 2011-0394191 at first, but I think I get it now.