REFUND OF TAX

Dominion, Volume 23, Issue 169, 12 April 1930, Page 15

REFUND OF TAX

CLAIM BY COMPANY Hearing of the case, in which the Dominion Farmers’ Institute Co., Ltd., claimed a refund of £341 from the. Commissioner of Taxes was concluded in the Supreme Court yesterday. The claim was in respect of a block ot land adjoining the company’s building which during the period covered by the assessment was vacant and .from which certain revenue had been derived. The Chief Justice (Sir Michael Myers) was on the bench, Mr. N. A. hoden appeared for the company, and the Solici-tor-General (Air. A. Fair, K.C.) for the Commissioner of Taxes. Mr. Fair said that appellant's contention was that if the land was bought to be used in the future for the purposes of the company's business and. was held vacant, the company would still be entitled to the five per cent, allowance against the income received from the other land. If that were so, then the result really was that the land was not paying land tax or income tax. There plight be a case, then, where the concession received in the way of income tax was greater than the land tax paid oti the vacant land. The Commissioner's point of view was that in this case he had granted the taxpayer a concession which a strict construction of the statute showed he was not entitled to. Mr. Fair submitted that the land was not being actually used exclusively for the purposes of the business; in fact, it could have been rented and let in the casual way it was only if it had not been required for the purposes of the business. It was not being exclusively used for the purpose of deriving rentals, royalties. or other profits, and if an allowance had been granted it was limited to the amount of income derived from the land. If there was no income, there was no allowance. Decision was reserved.