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R (Greyhound Board of Great Britain Ltd) v Welsh Ministers [2026] EWHC 670 (Admin) What are the practical implications of this case? The ruling reinforces the constitutional divide between the courts and the legislature. It explains that the scheme and framework of the Government of Wales Act 2006 (GWA 2006) embody that separation of powers, and that any judicial attempt to recognise and enforce a common law obligation on Welsh Ministers to consult prior to introducing legislation in the Senedd would trespass upon that boundary. This is not a departure from established principle; case law has already upheld comparable rules for lawmakers in Scotland and at Westminster. However, this is the first express confirmation of the position for Welsh lawmakers, and the first time this dimension of the GWA 2006 has been analysed in such depth. The court examined earlier
The solution arrived through the United Nations Compensation Commission (UNCC), a quasi‑judicial body handling mass claims, created under UN Security Council Resolution 687. By addressing environmental harm—most notably via its ‘F4’ claim class—the UNCC set a seminal benchmark shaping how international law and contemporary arbitral panels allocate financial responsibility for wartime ecological devastation. With present-day wars in areas such as Eastern Europe and the Middle East bringing dam breaches, strikes on chemical facilities, and the burning of farmland, the UNCC’s legacy endures as an essential reference point for states, global investors, and companies engaged in post‑conflict arbitration. The F4 claims: Quantifying the unquantifiable Prior to the 1990s, mechanisms in international law for war reparations overwhelmingly favoured property loss, foregone earnings, and bodily injury. The natural world was commonly treated as a mute, non-compensable victim of armed hostilities...
Understanding the farming business as a business Many farms still use long-standing structures that arose by habit, not strategy. Sole traders, informal partnerships and outdated partnership deeds are common. While once effective, such setups can cause major issues around succession, tax planning and involving the next generation. A corporate team can take a fresh, business-led view of the farm, asking: Who owns the land and other critical assets? Who manages daily operations? Who carries the risk and who enjoys the return? What is the enduring plan for succession? From this review, the team can confirm whether the current setup is fit for purpose or if an alternative — for example an updated partnership agreement, a company, a limited liability partnership, or a blended model — would better meet the family’s aims. Tax efficiency through joined-up advice Tax sits at the centre of most
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In this issue: Budgets and finance bills Companies and corporation tax Employment taxes VAT Individuals and income tax Daily and weekly news alerts New and updated content Dates for your diary Trackers Useful information Tax Highlights 2024/2025 Budgets and finance bills Progress of Finance Bill 2025 On 10–11 December 2024, the Committee of the whole House examined, without amendment, clauses on capital gains tax rates and reliefs, oil and gas, VAT on private school fees and SDLT. The committee stage is due to finish by 4 February 2025. National Insurance Contributions ( Secondary Class 1 Contributions) Bill has third reading On 17 December 2024, the National Insurance Contributions ( Secondary Class 1 Contributions) Bill was taken by a Committee of the whole House in the Commons. With no changes, it skipped report, had its third reading, and...
Budgets and Finance Bills In this edition: Budgets and Finance Bills Anti-avoidance Taxes management and litigation VAT Individuals and income tax Employment taxes Companies and corporation tax Daily and weekly news alerts New and updated content Dates for your diary Trackers Useful information Draft Welsh Budget 2025–26 published On 10 December 2024, Finance Minister Mark Drakeford unveiled the draft Welsh Budget for 2025–26. The principal tax measures are: retaining the Welsh Rates of Income Tax at 10p, keeping parity with taxpayers in England; from 11 December 2024, raising Land Transaction Tax on higher rates residential property transactions by 1 percentage point in every band; and from 1 April 2025, lifting Landfill Disposals Tax to £6.30 (lower rate), £126.15 (standard rate) and £189.25 for unauthorised disposals, maintaining the latter at 150% of the...
HMRC v Colchester Institute Corporation [2024] UKUT 397 ( TCC) The striking aspect of this matter is its close linkage to an earlier case concerning the same taxpayer, where the UT determined that materially comparable supplies across other VAT periods constituted supplies of services for consideration ( Colchester Institute Corporation v HMRC [2020] UKUT 368 ( TCC)), as regards the consideration point. HMRC could not appeal that point because, in the litigation as a whole, it was the winning party, having successfully defended its decision to refuse the taxpayer’s output tax refund claims on alternative grounds. The doctrine of judicial comity indicated that, in practice, the UT was expected, though not compelled, to follow its own earlier determination on the consideration question. Further, there is no ‘leapfrog’ route enabling cases to advance from the FTT directly to the Court of Appeal (whereas such a...
AXA Sun Life plc and other companies v Commissioners of Inland Revenue and another [2024] EWCA Civ 1430 What are the practical implications of this case? This judgment provides clear and practical guidance on: how to define the scope of a ‘ GLO issue’; the default rule that a determination on a GLO issue binds those on the group register at the relevant time; and the circumstances in which the court may properly depart from that rule. What is a GLO issue GLO issues should, so far as practicable, be stated with precision and framed so they can be answered as GLO issues; if an issue is ‘fact-specific’ to the parties in a test claim, it is unlikely to be suitable for determination as a GLO issue. ......
Hoyle and others v HMRC [2024] UKFTT 1060 ( TC) The LLPs were established as part of a scheme to purchase film rights from a studio and then lease them for 15 years to a lessee—typically a studio SPV. Around 80% of the members’ capital was financed through borrowings from the Bank of Ireland ( BOI). To secure the lease rentals payable over the 15-year term, the studio placed deposits with ABN Amro at sums at least equal to the loans; these deposits were later taken over by BOI. On the basis that they conducted a trade of exploiting film rights, the LLPs claimed film tax credits. The LLPs then allocated the ensuing trading loss to the appellants, who claimed sideways relief for their respective shares under sections 380 and 381 of the Income and Corporation Taxes Act 1988, in order to shelter other...
L v HMRC [2024] UKFTT 1044 ( TC) An executive director taxpayer was entitled to base salary, a discretionary bonus and a long‑term incentive plan award. After being made redundant in April 2013, she brought proceedings against her employer alleging discrimination, harassment, unfair dismissal and unequal pay. The dispute was resolved in March 2014 by a settlement agreement under which the employer paid a lump sum expressed to comprise several elements: deferred cash compensation and incentive awards, a payment for injury to feelings, a sum in connection with the termination of employment, a payment to settle the discrimination claim, and an amount relating to the equal pay claim. Following the settlement, HMRC issued a closure notice amending the taxpayer’s self‑assessment return, treating those parts of the settlement attributed to financial losses said to flow from the employer’s...
Rupert Grint v HMRC [2024] UKFTT 956 ( TC). In 2011, a decade after filming began on the first Harry Potter film, Clay 10 Ltd was incorporated to supply Mr Grint’s acting services. Mr Grint was the only shareholder, while his father, who was also his manager, acted as the sole director. The company received the actor’s existing and future rights, together with business information and goodwill, for consideration of £8.5m. That consideration was left outstanding on a shareholder loan account, with £4.5m treated as consideration for goodwill, records and rights. In his 2011–12 tax return, Mr Grint returned that sum as a capital gain and claimed entrepreneurs’ relief. HMRC opened an enquiry and, by closure notice, charged the £4.5m to income tax rather than capital gains tax, on the basis that the ‘sale of occupation income’ provisions in Chapter 4 of Part 13 of the...
FTT allows taxpayer’s R& D appeal ( Stage One Creative Services Ltd v HMRC) In Stage One Creative Services Ltd v HMRC [2024] UKFTT 1059 ( TC), the FTT upheld the company’s appeal concerning R& D claims. The business delivered engineering, construction and automation solutions for live events and installations. One project required it to design, build and install an intricate scenic set for a theatre production: an automated ‘pearl’ that flew across the auditorium and then opened to reveal a performer inside. The company sought R& D relief on costs incurred under multiple contracts, supported by detailed R& D reports. Typically, clients would approach with an idea and were more focused on the end result, not the methods adopted. The written agreements made no reference to R& D and were on a fixed-price basis, giving the company freedom to determine what research and...
In this issue: Budgets and Finance Bills Taxes management and litigation Employment taxes Companies and corporation tax International Real estate tax Daily and weekly news alerts Dates for your diary Trackers New and updated content Useful information Budgets and Finance Bills Finance Bill 2025 has second reading Finance Bill 2024–25 — also known as the Autumn Finance Bill 2024 and Finance Bill 2025 ( FB 2025) — was published on 7 November 2024 and reached its second reading on 27 November. The Bill remained unchanged from the version first released, and the House resolved that scrutiny would be divided between a Committee of the whole House and a Public Bill Committee......
AJ Bell’s chief executive contacted HM Treasury on 25 November 2024, pressing for a reconsideration of reforms first set out by the Chancellor of the Exchequer in the 30 October 2024 Budget, which would, from 6 April 2027, fold unspent pension pots and pension-related death benefits into an individual’s estate for inheritance tax ( IHT) purposes. Under the proposals, beneficiaries receiving lump-sum pension assets exceeding £325,000 from a deceased person’s estate would face a 40% tax charge. Up to now, retirement savings worth as much as £1,073,100 have been excluded from inheritance tax. The letter urged a rethink of these proposals specifically......
HMRC v The Taxpayer and others [2024] UKUT 364 ( TCC) Absent any appeal to the Court of Appeal, the decision will be republished without anonymisation on 11 December 2024. In September 2021, the First-tier Tax Tribunal ( FTT), by way of an unpublished ruling, ordered that preliminary steps on the taxpayer’s substantive appeal be conducted in private. That appeal related to HMRC’s refusal of certain tax deductions, and HMRC challenged that privacy direction. In January 2024, the UT set aside the FTT’s order ( HMRC v The Taxpayer [2024] UKUT 12 ( TCC)), concluding there were material errors of law. That subsequent ruling was itself anonymised while any further appeal was in prospect. In April 2024, the taxpayer appealed to the UT against the January 2024 decision, seeking a direction that, if the taxpayer’s bid for anonymity were refused, the...
Background to the consultation Between 22 March and 29 April 2022, the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development ( OECD) undertook a public consultation, concluding with a meeting on 23 May 2022. This led to OECD-level finalisation of the rules and commentary for both the CARF and updates to the CRS, promoting consistency across jurisdictions. In November 2023, the UK, together with 47 other countries and territories—including the Crown Dependencies of Guernsey, Jersey and the Isle of Man, and the UK’s Overseas Territories of the Cayman Islands and Gibraltar—signed a Joint Statement committing to swiftly transpose the CARF into domestic law and to activate exchange agreements so that exchanges can commence by 2027. Although the OECD CARF/ CRS suite followed a public consultation, it includes optional components and does not prescribe detailed practical implementation. Consequently, HMRC held a consultation from 6 March 2024 to 29 May 2024 to...
In this issue: Taxes management and litigation Companies and corporation tax International Finance Devolution Energy and environment VAT Daily and weekly news alerts New and updated content Dates for your diary Trackers Useful information Taxes management and litigation Court of Appeal dismisses DPT judicial review ( R (oao Refinitiv Ltd and others) v HMRC) In R (oao Refinitiv Ltd), the Court of Appeal rejected the companies’ appeal against the Upper Tribunal’s ( UT) refusal to permit their judicial review claim concerning diverted profits tax ( DPT) charging notices. See News Analysis: Court of Appeal dismisses DPT judicial review ( Refinitiv Ltd v HMRC). UT finds FTT made errors when setting aside HMRC best judgment assessment ( HMRC v Sintra Global) In Sintra Global, the UT overturned the First-tier Tax Tribunal’s ( FTT) decision insofar as it...
What is being proposed? The consultation sets out plans to broaden tax conditionality checks to additional sectors — specifically waste, animal welfare and transport. The intention is to tackle the hidden economy by making sure firms in these fields meet their tax duties. HMRC views the waste sector as particularly exposed to hidden economy behaviour and has already brought in tax conditionality for scrap metal dealer licences — in England and Wales from April 2022, and in Scotland and Northern Ireland from October 2023. The consultation specifically proposes widening tax conditionality to include waste carriers, brokers and dealers, as well as activities operating under waste exemptions. What is a tax conditionality check? A tax conditionality check requires a licence holder in a designated sector to verify proper tax registration when applying for, or renewing, a licence. The consultation suggests that the process, and the...
HMRC v Sintra Global Inc & another [2024] UKUT 346 ( TCC) A penalty arose from the company’s purportedly dishonest omission to tell HMRC that it was liable to register for VAT and to file VAT returns, and it rested on a ‘best judgment’ assessment made by HMRC under section 73 of the Value Added Tax Act 1994 ( VATA 1994). The UT sent back to the FTT the questions about the assessment’s validity and amount, remitting those issues for reconsideration and fresh findings. The dispute involved two offshore companies, both directed by the same individual, which HMRC alleged participated in the fraudulent redirection of alcohol into the UK and the subsequent sale of that alcohol in the UK market. The FTT had upheld the appellants’ challenges. HMRC then took the matter to the UT on six grounds, contesting the FTT’s...
R (on the application of Cobalt Data Centre 2 LLP and another) v Commissioners for His Majesty’s Revenue and Customs [2024] UKSC 40 Background This appeal addresses the criteria governing entitlement to the initial 100% capital allowances ( EZA) for expenditure on constructing buildings within an enterprise zone under CAA 2001. The focus is CAA 2001, s 298(1), which sets the cut-off for construction spend as either: (a) ten years from the date the site first became part of the zone; or (b) twenty years from that same date if the relevant expenditure is incurred pursuant to a contract made within the initial ten-year window. The judgment labels years one to ten as “the first period” and years eleven to twenty as “the second period”. The appellants (the taxpayers) maintained that their spending on building data centres was incurred “under a contract entered into within those ten...
R (oao Refinitiv Ltd and others) v HMRC [2024] EWCA Civ 1412 Three claimant companies delivered services, including services in respect of software, new product and content development, and data hosting, to a Swiss-based group entity that centrally held valuable intellectual property ( IP) assets. The DPT notices charged the companies to tax for the 2018 accounting period by reference to a 'relevant alternative provision' ( RAP). That RAP employed a 'profit-split' methodology, effectively apportioning, for the 2018 accounting period, both the Swiss entity’s annual profits and the profits realised on the disposal of the relevant IP assets, by reference to the claimants’ respective contributions made through the provision of the services. The total DPT was in excess of £167m. The claimants contended that HMRC had acted inconsistently and, accordingly, that it had acted unlawfully in public law terms......
On 30 October 2024, alongside the Autumn Budget, HMRC launched a consultation on proposals to modernise and reform the UK’s tax administration system. The consultation seeks views on potential changes to HMRC’s powers, intended to make it simpler and quicker for taxpayers to put matters right, while helping HMRC collect tax more effectively and efficiently. What is the background to this consultation? There has been a concentrated effort in recent years to shrink the ‘tax gap’—the difference between what is owed to HMRC and what is actually paid. Through this Budget, the current government have signalled continued commitment to that goal. The latest figures indicate that careless errors—particularly by individuals and small businesses—account for most of the shortfall. Individually small, these mistakes collectively amount to very large sums. A series of consultations in recent years has examined reform of the UK’s tax...
Lefort v Revenue and Customs Commissioners [2024] UKFTT 926 ( TC) What are the practical implications of this case? For advisers acting for appellants and HMRC, Lefort underscores the tightly confined remit of the FTT when reviewing an appeal against revocation of an FP 2014 certificate under the FP 2014 Regulations, SI 2013/1741, reg 12(3). The tribunal’s sole task is to decide whether HMRC had reason to believe a protection-cessation event occurred under paragraph 1(3), Part 1 of Schedule 22 to the Finance Act 2013 ( FA 2013). Even where such an event is triggered by a mistaken payment, the FTT has no scope to grapple with the mistake itself. The FTT differentiated Lefort from the Upper Tribunal’s ruling in Lobler v HMRC [2015] UKUT 0152 ( TCC), explaining that Lobler concerned rectification, not rescission. This difference matters for...
In this issue: Budgets and Finance Bills Finance International VAT Companies and corporation tax Employment taxes Real estate tax Taxes management and litigation Daily and weekly news alerts New and updated content Dates for your diary Trackers Useful information Budgets and Finance Bills Publication of the National Insurance Contributions ( Secondary Class 1 Contributions) Bill First read and published on 13 November 2024, the National Insurance Contributions ( Secondary Class 1 Contributions) Bill would: amend the Social Security Contributions and Benefits Act 1992 to raise the secondary Class 1 NICs rate from 13.8% to 15% with effect from 6 April 2025 amend the Social Security ( Contributions) Regulations 2001, SI 2001/1004, to reduce the secondary threshold for secondary Class 1 NICs and the prescribed equivalents of those thresholds for the 2025–26 tax year ...
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When evaluating a general damages claim, the practitioner ought initially to refer to the Judicial College Guidelines (JCG)...
This Practice Note This Practice Note reviews mechanisms used in settling litigation. A Tomlin order consists of a consent order paired with a schedule. It operates to stay proceedings on terms that have been agreed. The provisions contained in the schedule may remain confidential. This Practice Note describes the scope of confidentiality attaching to the schedule and sets out how it differs from a standard consent order. Sample wording for a Tomlin order is included, alongside links to precedents, as well as guidance on court approval. It also addresses varying, setting aside and enforcing a Tomlin order, including the considerations the court will take into account when handling applications for each. Further guidance is provided on interpreting and applying the relevant provisions of the CPR; however, some courts and divisions impose very specific requirements for both drafting and approval, and for approaching the schedule and confidentiality issues. Accordingly, you must consider the particular rules and court guide provisions in the forum where your claim is proceeding when drawing up the Tomlin order...
Date [ date ] Parties [ name of Landlord ] [ of OR incorporated in England and Wales (company registration number [ number ]) with its registered office at ] [ address ] (Landlord) [ name of Tenant ] [ of OR incorporated in England and Wales (company registration number [ number ]) with its registered office at ] [ address ] (Tenant) [ [ name of Guarantor ] [ of OR incorporated in England and Wales (company registration number [ number ]) with its registered office at ] [ address ] (Guarantor) ] [ [ name of Mortgagee ] [ of OR incorporated in England and Wales (company registration number [ number ]) with its registered office at ] [ address ] (Mortgagee) ] Definitions Within this Deed, the terms below shall be interpreted as follows: [ Annual Rent • the annual sum reserved under the Lease; ] [ Insurance Rent • the Tenant’s share of the Landlord’s costs of insuring the Property (as set out in the Lease); ] Lease • the lease of the Property dated [ date ], entered into between (1) [ the Landlord OR [ name ...
I, [ name ], of [ address ], solemnly and sincerely state that: [ Matters to be verified, set out in numbered paragraphs ] I make this solemn statement in good conscience, believing it to be true, and pursuant to the provisions of the Statutory Declarations Act 1835. DECLARED at [ details ] this [ day ] day of [ month and year ] Before me ................................................................................ [ signature of the person before whom the declaration is made ] A [ commissioner for oaths OR [ solicitor OR [ insert other qualification ] ] authorised to administer oaths ]...
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