HMRC v J Wilkes

In HMRC v J Wilkes [2022] EWCA Civ 1612 (7 December 2022) the CA confirmed the decision of the UT that discovery assessments were invalid. The assessment was made to recover the high income child benefit charge (HICBC) in circumstances where the taxpayer (W) had neither made tax returns nor been required to do so. 

W was liable to the HICBC but was not aware of this until HMRC contacted him about it by way of a ‘nudge’ letter. HMRC subsequently issued discovery assessments for the HICBC but W argued that these were invalid. Both the FTT and UT agreed with the taxpayer and HMRC appealed. Their appeal required the CA to consider three issues. 

The first issue was that a purposive construction should be applied to TMA 1970 s 29(1)(a) so that ‘income which ought to have been assessed to income tax’ should be read as including any amount...