Fenced in

The taxpayers sold fish aquariums and ponds. The retail premises and the partners’ home was on one side of a main road while opposite was a field with a large storage lake.

The land and lake had been surrounded by a not very secure timber-post-and-barbed-wire fence – which was apparently in a bad state when the property was purchased.

In 2002 galvanised steel palisade-style fencing was erected; in 2006 the rest of the field was similarly fenced in the aim being to improve security and prevent poaching.

HMRC rejected a claim that the cost of the fence should be treated as a repair and the taxpayers contended that it was plant and a security measure.

HMRC agreed that under CAA 2001 s 33 a fence might be...