Articles tagged as Tax Law
Latest Law Papers tagged as Tax Law
Including law essays, dissertations, problem questions, case summaries, and law lectures, suitable for law students working towards their LLB / LLM qualifications or those studying for the new SQE.
Commissioners for Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs v London Clubs Management Ltd [2020] UKSC 49
Case Summaries
The Supreme Court dismissed HMRC’s appeal about the gaming-duty treatment of free non-negotiable chips and bet vouchers issued by a casino. It held that these promotional items are not stakes staked with a value in money or money’s worth when a banker’s profits are calculated under the Finance Act 1997. Their face value therefore does […] ...
Last modified: 4th Nov 2026
Commissioners for Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs v Parry and others [2020] UKSC 35
Case Summaries
Mrs Staveley moved pension funds to a different plan and did not take benefits before her death. Her executors disputed two inheritance tax charges. The Supreme Court treated the decision to transfer and the omission to draw benefits separately under the legislation then in force. Mrs Staveley died in December 2006. Shortly beforehand she transferred […] ...
Last modified: 4th Nov 2026
Commissioners for Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs v Joint Administrators of Lehman Brothers International (Europe) [2019] UKSC 12
Case Summaries
The Supreme Court decided that interest paid to proving creditors out of the surplus in the administration of Lehman Brothers International (Europe) was “yearly interest”. Although it was paid as a lump sum only after a surplus had been found, and did not accrue from day to day, it compensated creditors for being kept out […] ...
Last modified: 4th Nov 2026
SAE Education Ltd v Commissioners for Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs [2019] UKSC 14
Case Summaries
The Supreme Court held that SAE Education Ltd was a college of Middlesex University, so its supplies of higher education in the United Kingdom were exempt from VAT. A body need not be a constitutional part of a university to be “a college of such a university”. What matters is whether its educational work is […] ...
Last modified: 4th Nov 2026
Telereal Trillium v Hewitt [2019] UKSC 23
Case Summaries
The Supreme Court considered how to value a vacant Blackpool office for rating where comparable offices were occupied at substantial rents, but the parties agreed that nobody would have paid a positive rent for the building itself. By a majority, it held that the statutory hypothesis still required the value to be assessed by reference […] ...
Last modified: 4th Nov 2026
Hancock and another v Commissioners for Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs [2019] UKSC 24
Case Summaries
The Supreme Court held that Mr and Mrs Hancock could not use a mixed conversion of loan notes to take the gain on their sale of shares in Blubeckers Ltd outside capital gains tax. Although some notes had become qualifying corporate bonds before all the notes were converted together into further such bonds, the conversion […] ...
Last modified: 4th Nov 2026
R (on the application of Derry) v Commissioners for Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs [2019] UKSC 19
Case Summaries
Mr Derry claimed share loss relief of £414,500 against his 2009/10 income after selling shares at a loss. The Supreme Court held that sections 23 and 131 to 133 of the Income Tax Act 2007 gave him a clear entitlement to deduct that loss in the year he specified, and that Schedule 1B to the […] ...
Last modified: 4th Nov 2026
Routier and another v Commissioners for Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs [2019] UKSC 43
Case Summaries
The Supreme Court held that a gift of United Kingdom assets to a charitable trust governed by Jersey law was entitled to inheritance tax relief. Because the EU rules on free movement of capital do not apply in Jersey, the transfer was a movement of capital to a third country, and a judge-made restriction confining […] ...
Last modified: 4th Nov 2026
OWD Ltd trading as Birmingham Cash and Carry (In Liquidation) and another v Commissioners for Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs [2019] UKSC 30
Case Summaries
The Supreme Court held that HMRC could not allow three duty-paid alcohol wholesalers to keep trading while they appealed refusals of approval under the Alcohol Wholesaler Registration Scheme. HMRC had already decided that the wholesalers were not fit and proper, even for a limited time and even with conditions. Neither section 88C of the Alcoholic […] ...
Last modified: 4th Nov 2026
Commissioners for Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs v Frank A Smart & Son Ltd [2019] UKSC 39
Case Summaries
The Supreme Court held that a farming company could deduct VAT paid on buying Single Farm Payment entitlements. The subsidies were outside the scope of VAT, but the company bought the entitlements to fund its taxable business, and objective evidence of that purpose preserved the right to deduct. The business and the claim Frank A […] ...
Last modified: 4th Nov 2026
Iceland Foods Ltd v Berry [2018] UKSC 15
Case Summaries
The Supreme Court held that the specialised air handling system in an Iceland store, used mainly to keep its refrigerated cabinets operating, formed part of a trade process. It therefore had to be ignored when calculating the store’s rateable value under the Valuation for Rating (Plant and Machinery) (England) Regulations 2000. The Court allowed Iceland’s […] ...
Last modified: 4th Nov 2026
JP Whitter (Water Well Engineers) Limited v Commissioners for Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs [2018] UKSC 31
Case Summaries
HMRC cancelled a company’s registration for gross payment under the Construction Industry Scheme after repeated late PAYE payments, without considering the likely serious effect on its business. The Supreme Court held that the discretion to cancel registration under section 66 of the Finance Act 2004 must be exercised consistently with the scheme’s compliance objectives and […] ...
Last modified: 4th Nov 2026
Project Blue Limited v Commissioners for Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs [2018] UKSC 30
Case Summaries
The Supreme Court held, by a majority, that Project Blue Limited was liable for £50 million in stamp duty land tax on a notional transaction arising from its purchase of Chelsea Barracks. Sub-sale relief and an exemption for Shari’a-compliant Ijara finance would otherwise have produced no tax charge, but their combination engaged the anti-avoidance rule […] ...
Last modified: 4th Nov 2026
Commissioners for Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs v Taylor Clark Leisure Plc [2018] UKSC 35
Case Summaries
The Supreme Court held that Taylor Clark Leisure Plc had not claimed repayment of overpaid VAT in time merely because Carlton Clubs Ltd, a former member of its VAT group, had written to HM Revenue and Customs. Under the United Kingdom rules, the representative member is the taxable person, and a repayment claim must be […] ...
Last modified: 4th Nov 2026
Totel Ltd v Commissioners for Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs [2018] UKSC 44
Case Summaries
A trader appealing a VAT assessment must generally pay or deposit the disputed tax first unless hardship is shown, unlike a taxpayer appealing an assessment to income tax, capital gains tax or stamp duty land tax. Totel Ltd argued that this difference breached the EU principle of equivalence. The Supreme Court dismissed the appeal because […] ...
Last modified: 4th Nov 2026
Prudential Assurance Company Ltd v Commissioners for Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs [2018] UKSC 39
Case Summaries
The Supreme Court held that a UK company receiving overseas portfolio dividends must be given a tax credit by reference to the foreign nominal rate of tax, not only the tax actually paid overseas, so as to match the exemption given to domestic dividends. It rejected a general claim to compound interest in unjust enrichment […] ...
Last modified: 4th Nov 2026
UKI (Kingsway) Limited v Westminster City Council [2018] UKSC 67
Case Summaries
Westminster City Council handed a completion notice, addressed only to the owner, to a receptionist at a newly developed office building. She scanned it and emailed it to the owner, UKI (Kingsway) Limited. The Supreme Court held that this was valid service: the council caused the notice to be received, and an electronic copy was […] ...
Last modified: 3rd Nov 2026
Newbigin v S J & J Monk [2017] UKSC 14
Case Summaries
The Supreme Court decided that a commercial building in the course of redevelopment does not have to be valued for business rates as if it were still a usable office. On the day that mattered, the first floor of Avalon House in Sunderland had been stripped out and was incapable of beneficial occupation. The statutory […] ...
Last modified: 3rd Nov 2026
Volkswagen Financial Services (UK) Ltd v Commissioners for Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs [2017] UKSC 26
Case Summaries
When Volkswagen Financial Services supplied cars on hire purchase, it paid VAT on general overheads that could not be tied to a particular supply. The Supreme Court did not decide whether any of that VAT was deductible against the output tax on the taxable supply of the cars, because it considered a reference to the […] ...
Last modified: 3rd Nov 2026
The Commissioners for Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs v The Investment Trust Companies [2017] UKSC 29
Case Summaries
Investment trust companies paid VAT on investment management services that were in fact exempt under EU law. They sought restitution from HMRC of sums not recovered through their managers under the statutory scheme. The Supreme Court held that they had no claim in unjust enrichment against HMRC, and that the statutory bar on such a […] ...
Last modified: 3rd Nov 2026
RFC 2012 Plc (in liquidation) v Advocate General for Scotland [2017] UKSC 45
Case Summaries
Rangers agreed to reward employees partly through a trust. The trustee later lent money to the employees. For tax purposes the decisive question was what the employer paid for when it put money into the trust, before any loan was made. The scheme From 2001/02 to 2008/09, companies in the Murray group paid money to […] ...
Last modified: 3rd Nov 2026
Littlewoods Limited and others v Commissioners for Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs [2017] UKSC 70
Case Summaries
After HMRC repaid Littlewoods £205 million in overpaid VAT and £268 million in simple interest, Littlewoods claimed a further £1.25 billion in compound interest going back more than 40 years. The Supreme Court held that the Value Added Tax Act 1994 excludes any concurrent common-law claim to that interest. It also held that EU law […] ...
Last modified: 3rd Nov 2026
R (De Silva and another) v Commissioners for Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs [2017] UKSC 74
Case Summaries
Two limited partners used losses on film investments to claim income tax relief for earlier years. When the partnerships later agreed much smaller losses with HMRC, the partners said it was too late to alter their individual claims. The answer depended on which year’s tax return contained the claim and what HMRC had already taken […] ...
Last modified: 3rd Nov 2026
UBS AG and DB Group Services (UK) Ltd v HMRC [2016] UKSC 13
Case Summaries
Two banks paid bonuses in shares whose forfeiture conditions had been designed to bring them within a tax exemption. The Court held that the legislation concerned genuine commercial restrictions. The employees received shares, and it was their value at acquisition that mattered. HMRC appealed in two cases concerning discretionary bankers’ bonuses paid in the 2003/04 […] ...
Last modified: 3rd Nov 2026
Eclipse Film Partners No 35 LLP v Commissioners for Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs [2016] UKSC 24
Case Summaries
The Supreme Court decided that the First-tier Tribunal cannot use its case-management powers to order one party to pay the other’s costs of a hearing bundle where the costs rules forbid that order. Eclipse had opted out of costs liability in a Complex tax appeal, so the Tribunal could award costs only for wasted costs […] ...
Last modified: 3rd Nov 2026
