Glimmer of hope

KEY POINTS

• HMRC claimed bricklayers were employees of the contractor.
• The use of the word ‘employer’ in the contract.
• Badges of trade.
• The ‘overall picture’ test.

The Special Commissioners’ decision in Castle Construction (Chesterfield) SpC 723 is unusual in a number of respects.

First the case was taken by the contractor not the individual worker or workers.

Second this was not an IR35 case regarding status instead it determined whether individual workers of a construction company were employees or self-employed subcontractors. It was not a test case but a case decided on its own facts.

Nevertheless the Special Commissioner Howard Nowlan found the case very difficult to decide and this is reflected in a determination that runs to 29 pages.

A by-product of his approach was that he considered and...