Major residence cases set for appeal court

The Court of Appeal is set to turn its attention to two high-profile residence cases over the coming days.

The final decision in CRC v Grace is scheduled to be given on Wednesday 28 October at 9.30am. The case centres on British Airways long-haul pilot Lyle Dicker Grace, a naturalised citizen of Britain who has a home in Cape Town.

The previous ruling on the Chancery Division of the High Court saw the earlier Special Commissioner's decision overturned. Such a reversal had not been made by the court in a residence case for 100 years. (Further background information can be found in Mike Truman’s analysis piece Bowled by a googly.)

The long-running case of Robert Gaines-Cooper will take its turn in the Court of Appeal on either Tuesday 3 November or Wednesday 4 November. It will be heard with Davies and anor. The focus of both cases is HMRC’s possible failure to apply the tests as set out in the department’s IR20 booklet.

Mr Gaines-Cooper was previously found by the Special Commissioners to be both a resident and domicile of the UK. An appeal against the decision on the matter of domicile was rejected by the High Court, and leave to appeal was refused.

The issue of residence was successfully pursued by a judicial review application, which resulted in the right to appeal being granted in both Gaines-Cooper and Davies and anor. (This was covered by Taxation.co.uk in the news stories Gaines-Cooper begins judicial review hearing and HMRC 'came to obfuscate' in JR application.)

As one of the barristers appearing for Lyle Dicker Grace, Keith Gordon of Atlas Chambers was legally bound not to discuss the case. He was, however, able comment freely on the matter of Gaines-Cooper et al.

‘At long last, we will get some judicial comment on how IR20 should have been applied in practice,’ said Mr Gordon. ‘In other words: were the Revenue right to move the goalposts without warning?’

‘For those more interested in procedural matters, the case is also likely to clarify how such disputes should be dealt with in future. In Mr Gaines-Cooper's case, HMRC suggested that the facts be clarified by the Special Commissioners before any judicial review could be heard – whereas in Davies and anor, the judicial review proceedings are being heard before an appeal is heard by the Tribunal.’

Categories: News , Residence & domicile