TAX ON RACE STAKES

Evening Star, Issue 18157, 23 December 1922, Page 9

TAX ON RACE STAKES

MR GREENWOOD'S WINNINGS. AN UNSUCCESSFUL APPEAL. An interesting case was decided! last week In the Court of Review in Sydney in which tho appellants wore Mr G. D. Greenwood, of Now Zealand, and prominent racing men of Australia. In his judgment Judge Scholes hold that where racing was carried on as a business all prizes won are liable io income tax. The appellants—George Demi Greenwood, A. Irving Cox, and William Keoghi —appealed against the assessments of the State Commissioners of Taxation in respect to prize money _ won during the year 1920. jLlus Honor said it had been set out in argument that in order to bring these sums of money within the Income Tax Act a business in horse-racing must have been carried on. Greenwood, said His Honor, was a grazier, who had stations in Queensland and lived in New Zealand. He raced a large team of first-class horses. He paid his own trainer, had his own stables, and raced his horses in New Zealand and New South Wales. “It was stated that he was only an amateur,” said Hia Honor. “But when! a man carries on racing as Greenwood carries it on, I think that, notwithstanding that he la an amateur, a sportsman, and a lover of horses, ho is carryimg_ on a business. . Tho appeal, therefore, mil be dismissed."

In Cox’s case the facts were that in 1920 be Lad a horse which he ran in private races, and subsequently put in_a race for which there was a monetary prize. In the following year he bought two more horses and raced them on public _ courses, ilb Honor came to the conclusion that Cox wan not carrying on horse racing as a business during 1920, and therefore sustained the appeal. Referring to Keogh, His Honor said that he was a grazier, a storekeeper, and a wealthy man. There was no doubt that he raced horses as a business. He was part owner with Mr Moss in the racehorse Erasmus. In his case the appeal would be dismissed.