Mr Tahir Khawaja v The Commissioners for HM Revenue and Customs
| Jurisdiction | England & Wales |
| Judge | Lord Justice Patten |
| Judgment Date | 04 April 2014 |
| Neutral Citation | [2014] EWCA Civ 527 |
| Court | Court of Appeal (Civil Division) |
| Docket Number | A3/2013/3250 |
| Date | 04 April 2014 |
[2014] EWCA Civ 527
IN THE COURT OF APPEAL (CIVIL DIVISION)
ON APPEAL FROM THE UPPER TRIBUNAL
(TAX & CHANCERY CHAMBER)
Royal Courts of Justice
Strand
London WC2A 2LL
Lord Justice Patten
A3/2013/3250
The Applicant appeared in person assisted by Mr T Wheeler as a McKenzie friend
The Respondent did not appear and was not represented
This is a renewed application for permission to appeal by Mr Khawaja against a decision of the Upper Tribunal in the Tax and Chancery Chamber that was released on 12 August last year.
The issue before the tribunal concerned the imposition of penalties under the provisions of the Taxes Management Act, based on alleged under-declarations of income by Mr Khawaja in respect of his personal and business affairs. The matter started off before the General Commissioners and they made a decision basing themselves upon the relevant standard of proof being that of the criminal standard. That issue went on appeal to Mann J, who in a reserved judgment decided that they had applied the wrong standard of proof and that the correct standard of proof was the ordinary civil standard on the balance of probabilities.
An attempt was then made by Mr Khawaja to appeal that decision, without success. Permission was refused both on the papers and later by Moses LJ at an oral hearing. The decision of Mann J that the civil standard of proof is the applicable one has since been approved by this court in the subsequent decision of R (LG) v Independent Appeal Panel for Tom Hood School [2010] EWCA Civ 142.
The more important point is that it is not, in my view, open to the appellant to reargue the standard of proof point as part of an appeal against the determination of the Upper Tribunal. I say that because Mann J, on the appeal from the General Commissioners, was concerned to lay down authoritatively for the purposes of these proceedings what was the relevant standard of proof.
The matter was then remitted initially, as things then stood, to the Special Commissioners for determination of the penalties on that basis. Due to the changes in the tribunal system that came into force, that hearing eventually took place before the Upper Tribunal, but it, standing so to speak in the shoes of the Special Commissioners, was equally required, as it make clear in its judgment, to apply the judge's direction about the standard of proof in reaching its decision.
That point has been concluded by Mann J's...
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