Retrospective tax nightmare for Contractors using Offshore Trusts
A recent High Court ruling, Huiton v HMRC [2010], could spell financial ruin for those who have used Offshore Trusts in the past.
An Offshore Trust is an arrangement where a Contractor becomes a trustee of an Offshore Company, and gains the income they are due in the form of a trust, typically based in the Isle of Man and takes advantage of the Double Taxation Agreement between the UK and IOM so that income tax is not due on the trust in the UK.
In 2008 the Finance Act closed a loophole around Offshore Trusts and crucially for those who had used them in the past said that the change was to be “treated as always having had effect”.
Robert Huitson had started to use one such scheme in 2001. Montpelier Group were based in the Isle of Man, and Mr Huiton was paid his income through a trustee arrangement. HMRC sent him a demand for over £100,000 of unpaid tax and NI, and he challenged the legislation saying that retrospective changes in law infringed his Human Rights.
The judge decided that this was a “wholly artificial arrangement” and that HMRC was within its rights to seek retrospective payments in this case.
This will worry those who have used this kind of arrangements in the past, and many will be waiting to see the outcome if Huiton appeals the court's decision.
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Latest News
IR35 – Too early to start the wake now
You can almost hear a pin drop, as the entire contracting
world holds it’s collective breath waiting for the outcome of the review into
IR35.
At least it seems that the fact that a review is happening
has been universally welcomed, and most commentators would agree that it is
difficult to imagine anyone coming up with a more confusing set of rules than
we have in place now.
