In Hypertec Systèmes inc. v Agence du revenu du Québec, 2025 QCCQ 6704, the taxpayer, the administrative entity for a corporate group, incurred about $1.3 million of professional fees in respect of a shareholder dispute that included a claim for…
TFSA advantage “tax” is a-ok
I just wrote about TFSA over-contribution hell. The Federal Court of Appeal recently confirmed that the advantage “tax” is constitutional under section 53 of the Constitution Act, 1867 and that no due-diligence defence is available because it is a tax.…
Part VI.1 tax
The Part VI.1 tax rules, which date from the late 1980s, can apply in unexpected and unhelpful ways to transactions that have nothing to do with the harm at which the rules were aimed. (The Department of Finance, in other…
GLGI appeals struck
In a previous post, I discussed Kelly v R, 2026 TCC 53, in which Mr Justice Graham proposed to dismiss ongoing GLGI appeals as an abuse of process. Eight of the appellants to whom this proposal applied provided submissions for…
Trusts and Association, Part Deux
This is the second part of a series on trusts and the association rules. The first part appeared in the May 2026 issue of Canadian Tax Focus. The second part addresses how the rules can apply. Divorced Spouses Divorced spouses…
CCPC over-integration increases
Decreases in the dividend tax credit for ineligible dividends has increased over-integration on investment income earned via a corporation for individuals who are in the top bracket. The extra burden arising from earning and receiving investment income via a corporation…
Revisiting Stewart and Walls, again
A number of commentators, including Justice John Owen, have expressed unease with the reasoning of the Federal Court of Appeal in R v Paletta (Estate), 2022 FCA 86, and Brown v R, 2022 FCA 200. They might say “I told…
Allegation of Sham Trust Allocation
In Fiducie Famille Champoux c Agence du revenu du Québec, 2026 QCCQ 2430, Revenue Quebec had alleged a sham where a trust allocated to a beneficiary $800,000 of a $950,000 gain realized on the sale of shares. The beneficiary’s husband…
What is a settlement agreement?
The parties in a Tax Court appeal exchanged emails about settlement. The taxpayers’ counsel, via email, accepted an emailed counter-offer from the Crown. The Crown then sent minutes of settlement that contained terms not in the taxpayers’ original offer as…
Electronic reassessments
Subsection 244(14.1) of the Income Tax Act creates a presumption that a taxpayer has received a notice of assessment or reassessment on the day the CRA sends an email notifying the taxpayer that a document has been posted to the…