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Citation: 2003TCC46
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Date: 20030214
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Docket: 2002-2257(IT)G
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BETWEEN:
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IMPERIAL OIL LIMITED,
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Appellant,
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and
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HER MAJESTY THE QUEEN,
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Respondent,
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AND
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Docket: 2002-2695(IT)G
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BETWEEN:
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INCO LIMITED,
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Appellant,
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and
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HER MAJESTY THE QUEEN,
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Respondent.
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REASONS FOR ORDER
Bowman, A.C.J.
[1] Although the
appeals of these two companies are not related the Crown's
motions to strike the appeals out or, alternatively, to stay the
appeals were heard together on consent because the question is
the same. It is this: Can one file a return of income, obtain an
initial (sometimes called a "quick" or "desk"
assessment) based substantially on the return, file a notice of
objection to the assessment, wait ninety days and, if the
Minister has not responded by means of a confirmation or
reassessment, file an appeal to the Tax Court of Canada?
[2] The Crown says
one cannot. The appellants say the Income Tax Act
specifically permits them to do just that.
[3] The order sought
is as follows: (I am using the Inco motion. The wording is the
same in Imperial Oil except that the years referred to in
paragraph 3 of the grounds in the latter case are 1998 and
1999.)
THE MOTION IS FOR an Order
a) striking out
the Appellant's Notice of Appeal pursuant to paragraph
58(3)(a), or alternatively, pursuant to paragraph 58(3)(b) of the
General Procedure Rules, or alternatively,
b) striking out
the Appellant's Notice of Appeal pursuant to section 53 of
the General Procedure Rules, or alternatively, pursuant to
the Court's inherent jurisdiction to control its own process,
or in the further alternative,
c) staying the
Appellant's appeal pursuant to its inherent jurisdiction to
control its own process until the Canada Customs and Revenue
Agency has completed its audit of the Appellant's 1997 to
2000 taxation years and has decided whether or not to reassess
the Appellant for those years within the period provided by
subsection 152(4) of the Income Tax Act.
[4] The grounds are
stated in the notice of motion as follows:
1. that the Court
has no jurisdiction over the subject matter of the
Appellant's appeal, within the meaning of paragraph 58(3)(a)
of the General Procedure Rules, or alternatively,
2. that a
condition precedent of instituting a valid appeal to the Tax
Court of Canada, namely, the filing of a valid notice of
objection, within the meaning of subsection 165(1) of the
Income Tax Act, has not been met, within the meaning of
paragraph 58(3)(b) of the General Procedure Rules, or in
the further alternative,
3. that the
filing of the Notice of Appeal is premature and would thus
prejudice the fair hearing of the issues raised therein, as well
as such other issues that may arise following the completion of
the Canada Customs and Revenue Agency's audit of the
Appellant's 1997 to 2000 taxation years, within the meaning
of paragraph 53(a) of the General Procedure Rules, or in
the further alternative,
4. that the
Notice of Appeal is vexatious and an abuse of the process of the
Court, within the meaning of paragraph 53(b) and 53(c) of the
General Procedure Rules.
[5] I shall outline
first the facts in Inco. Inco is a large multinational mining
company. It filed its income tax return for 2000 on June 30,
2001 in which it computed its taxable income at $272,824,201 and
its Part I tax payable at $61,057,594. It filed an amended
return (the first amended return) for 2000 revising its income
and Part I tax downward to $238,309,131 and $51,006,806
respectively. In the original return it had omitted to deduct a
Part VI.1 tax deduction of $34,515,070.
[6] On July 17,
2001 the CCRA assessed the appellant on the basis of the first
amended return. The assessment was done electronically, a
mechanical, largely non-human, process in which the information
in the return is used. In virtually all cases there is no audit
performed at the stage of the initial assessment. The information
in the return is fed into the CCRA's mainframe computer
systems and a notice of assessment is issued. The computer
programs enable it to pick up and correct certain types of errors
(or what the computer is programmed to perceive as errors) and
this was in fact done in the case of Inco's assessment for
2000, where the computer adjusted Inco's opening balance of
non-capital losses downward by about $74,000,000. An error also
made by the computer in reducing the Part VI.1 deduction
from $34,515,070 to $34,065,070. All this resulted in the taxable
income and tax being altered by the computer.
[7] On
August 14, 2001 Inco told the CCRA of an error and asked
that it be corrected. I base this statement upon an assertion in
the respondent's written argument where it is said "On
August 14, 2001 the Appellant notified the CCRA of an error
committed by the Appellant and requested that this error be
correct[ed]" and on August 22, 2001 the CCRA again
without audit gave effect to the Appellant's request for the
2000 taxation year. The reply to the notice of appeal, upon which
this assertion is based, referred in paragraph 5 to
"the said error of reducing the Part VI.1 tax
deduction" (i.e. the error made by the Minister's
computer). Carme K. Lau's affidavit does not deal with this
specific point. I suspect the statement in the reply is more
likely to be correct although the point is not really relevant
here.
[8] On or about
October 25, 2001 the appellant filed another amended return
in which it reduced its previous deduction of non-capital losses
of $223,751,949 to $108,551,162 according to Mr. Lau's
affidavit on account of its own capital losses. The
appellant's "own capital losses" presumably is used
to distinguish the losses from that of a subsidiary, 321821 B.C.
Ltd., which was wound up into Inco in 1996.
[9] In this second
amended return for 2000 the appellant reported its taxable income
to be $238,309,134 and the Part I tax payable to be
$51,006,807.
[10] On January 8,
2002 the CCRA reassessed the appellant on precisely the amounts
reported in the second amended return.
[11] On or about
April 8, 2002 Inco filed with the CCRA a notice of objection
to the second reassessment in which it for the first time asked
for a deduction of foreign exchange losses on foreign currency
denominated debentures. It also asked for a deduction of
$346,859,296 on account of non-capital losses of which
$194,092,604 were to come out of the appellant's own
non-capital losses of 321821 B.C. Ltd.
[12] On July 8, 2002
Inco's solicitors filed a notice of appeal in the Tax Court
of Canada, 90 days having elapsed from April 8, 2002,
the date the notice of objection was filed, without any response
by the CCRA by way of confirmation or reassessment.
[13] The facts in Imperial
Oil are slightly less complicated but the point is the same.
Imperial Oil is a large multinational oil and gas company. It
filed its return of income for 1999 on June 28, 2000 and
declared its taxable income to be $72,971,888 and its Part I
tax to be $13,600,775.
[14] On November 21,
2001 the CCRA assessed Imperial Oil on the basis of the
information in the return. The reason it took about
16 months was because of a variety of computer problems at
the CCRA. As in Inco's case the assessment was generated
electronically without human intervention.
[15] On December 5,
2001 the CCRA reassessed the appellant as reported, except that
it removed the late filing penalties and interest.
[16] On March 4, 2002
the appellant filed a notice of objection with respect to the
December 5, 2001 reassessment for 1999 in which it asked for
the first time for a deduction on account of foreign exchange
losses on foreign currency denominated debentures as well as a
full deduction for the cost of customer lists.
[17] On June 10, 2002
the appellant filed a notice of appeal from the reassessment
dated December 5, 2001, more than 90 days having
elapsed from March 4, 2002, the date of filing the notice of
objection without any response by the CCRA by way of confirmation
or reassessment.
[18] In both cases the
respondent filed replies to the notices of appeal (in the case of
Imperial Oil, an amended reply) in which she denied many of the
allegations in the notices of appeal and responded to the
substance of the contentions raised in the notices of appeal. The
replies also raised objections to the right of the appellants to
object and to appeal in the manner in which they did.
[19] Before I deal with the
other matters raised in the motions, this is a convenient time to
mention the matter of section 8 of the Tax Court of
Canada Rules (General Procedure) which reads:
A motion to attack a proceeding or a step, document or direction
in a proceeding for irregularity shall not be made,
(a) after the
expiry of a reasonable time after the moving party knows or ought
reasonably to have known of the irregularity, or
(b) if the
moving party has taken any further step in the proceeding after
obtaining knowledge of the irregularity,
except with leave of the Court.
[20] The "fresh
step" rule is one that has been part of the rules of
practice and procedure in Canada and the United Kingdom for many
years. There is a great deal of jurisprudence on what constitutes
a fresh step but the rule is based on the view that if a party
pleads over to a pleading this implies a waiver of an
irregularity that might otherwise have been attacked. For two
reasons I do not think that the fresh step rule precludes the
respondent from bringing the motions. First, it is clear that by
filing the replies to the notices of appeal the respondent is not
waiving her objections to the filing of the notices of objection
and appeal. The replies clearly state the Crown's objection.
Second, a rather wide ranging attack on the appellants' right
to appeal, including allegations that that this court has no
jurisdiction, that the appeals are frivolous, vexatious and an
abuse of process is hardly an attack on an irregularity.
[21] I pass then to a
consideration of the merits of the motions. In both cases,
lengthy affidavits by senior officials of the CCRA were filed.
The statements in the affidavits were substantially repeated in
the respondent's written submissions and I need not set them
out in detail in these reasons. The affidavits and the written
submissions of the respondent constitute an extensive narrative
about the self-assessment process, the complexities of the audit
process, and the practices employed by taxpayers to protect
themselves from errors in their returns (such as filing
protective notices of objection or filing amended returns).
[22] I do not question the
assertion that audits are an extremely important aspect of the
CCRA's administration of the Income Tax Act within the
context of the self-assessing system which is so integral a part
of our Canadian tax system. Nor do I doubt that the audit process
in the case of large companies such as Inco or Imperial Oil is
complex and time consuming. One may assume that the system
described at length in the material filed on the two motions
works well, as do the objections and appeals procedures,
considering how long they have been around. It would be difficult
to take exception to the factual statements made in the material
on behalf of the respondent. Indeed, counsel for the appellants
in opposing the motions did not challenge the description of the
process.
[23] It boils down to this:
auditing Inco and Imperial Oil will take a long time and will
require devoting substantial human resources to the work. The
respondent states that the points raised by the appellants in
their objections and appeals have not been considered at the
audit level and their fast tracking the matters into court not
only puts a spanner into the orderly and deliberate progress of
the audit process but also catapults the respondent into court
with unseemly haste.
[24] Although this may be
inconvenient for the CCRA, it is not a reason to deprive a
taxpayer - whether it be a huge multinational corporation or the
humblest one of Her Majesty's loyal subjects - of clear
statutory rights that the Income Tax Act confers.
[25] Those rights are
simple and straightforward: a taxpayer who objects to an
assessment can file a notice of objection within 90 days of
the assessment and if the Minister of National Revenue does not
respond by way of a confirmation or a reassessment within
90 days of the filing of the notice of objection the
taxpayer may appeal to the Tax Court of Canada.
[26] There are a few
restrictions on the right of appeal, such as the following.
(a) One cannot
object to or appeal from a nil assessment.
(b)
Subsection 165(1.1) puts some detailed and specific
limitations on the right to object to assessments, notably where
the objection relates to a point that has previously been
determined by the court and the reassessment implements that
prior determination.
(c) Under
subsection 165(1.11) large corporations must set out
specifically each issue to be decided. Under
subsection 165(1.13) objections to subsequent assessments
can only be made if subsection 165(1.11) was complied with.
Otherwise the right of appeal to the court is curtailed under
subsection 169(2.1).
(d) Under
subsection 169(2) there are limitations on the right of
appeal similar to those in subsection 165(1.11).
(e) Where there
has been a prior loss determination for a year that has not been
objected to or appealed from one cannot object to an assessment
for a different year in which a loss different from the prior
loss determination is alleged.
[27] These are some of the
limitations on the right of objection and appeal. They all arise
out of specific wording in the Income Tax Act. There are
no explicit restrictions
(a) where a
taxpayer objects to an assessment based on its own return of
income; or
(b) where a taxpayer
objects to an assessment that does not result from an adjustment
by the Minister that is adverse to a position taken by the
taxpayer.
[28] The Crown says that
these restrictions are implicit. There must be very compelling
reasons to find that a taxpayer's rights under the Income
Tax Act are implicitly restricted where the rights are
explicitly conferred and restrictions are explicitly
expressed.
[29] Out of respect to
learned counsel for the respondent I shall deal with each of the
arguments presented by him. They are identical in both
motions.
[30] The first argument is
that an assessment that is the product of a taxpayer's own
calculations and accepted by the Minister (described by the
respondent as an "as filed assessment") rather than the
product of the Minister's calculations is not an assessment
that can be objected to under subsection 165(1) or appealed
from under subsection 169(1) of the Income Tax Act.
This contention is based upon the submission that the "plain
meaning" or "literal interpretation" of the
legislation must be rejected in favour of a "contextual and
purposive" approach. Counsel further relies upon the
principle that if the meaning of a provision is unclear and there
are two interpretations one of which leads to an absurdity and
one of which does not the latter should be chosen. This is based
on the well-known principle stated in Corporation of the City
of Victoria v. Bishop of Vancouver Island, [1921]
2 A.C. 384. However the Judicial Committee of the Privy
Council added a corollary to that principle to the effect that if
the words of a statute are clear effect must be given to them
even if they lead to an absurdity.
[31] I am unable to accept
the respondent's position on this point for two reasons:
(a) the words
are clear; and
(b) the
interpretation of "assessment" to mean the
ascertainment and fixation (Pure Spring Co. Ltd. v.
M.N.R., 2 DTC 844 at 851) of a taxpayer's
liability under the Income Tax Act whether the process
occurs and the notice is issued immediately after the filing of
the return without an audit or after a full audit does not lead
to an absurdity.
[32] There is no
justification as a matter of common sense or as a matter of
statutory interpretation to say that an assessment to which one
can object or from which one can appeal must be an assessment
based upon an audit by the Minister of National Revenue or in
which the Minister assesses in a manner that is inconsistent with
the way in which the taxpayer has filed. If Parliament wishes to
restrict the sort of assessment to which an objection can be
filed or from which an appeal can be taken it is perfectly
capable of saying so. It is not appropriate to read words into
the statute in order to give it a strained meaning that the plain
words do not reasonably bear.
[33] It is not necessary to
deal with the reasons for which the appellants have objected to
and appealed from the assessments based on their own filing or
determine whether their reasons are good or bad. It may be
assumed that these companies have better things to do with their
time and money than instruct their lawyers to file frivolous and
pointless appeals. Nonetheless counsel for the appellants
informed me that the purpose of filing the appeals was to
preserve the appellants' rights under proposed legislation
referred to in a Department of Finance News Release
No. 99-67 dated July 23, 1999 which contains the
following statement:
Finance Minister Paul Martin today released
proposed amendments regarding the tax treatment of certain
resource expenditures.
The proposed amendments are designed to deal
with two related issues. First, they would ensure that taxpayers
cannot obtain unintended tax relief by reclassifying certain
Canadian development expenses (CDE), which qualify for a
30-per-cent annual write-off, as Canadian exploration expenses
(CEE) qualifying for full deductibility in the year in which they
were incurred. Second, these changes would prevent the
reclassification, as CDE or CEE, of expenditures that have
consistently been treated by taxpayers in the resource sector as
relating to depreciable property, the cost of which is deducted
as capital cost allowance (CCA) within the limits specified in
the Income Tax Act.
Allowing these expenditures to be
reclassified would result in a windfall for taxpayers. The
windfall is due to the 100 per cent rate of write-off for CEE, as
opposed to lower rates of write-offs for CDE and CCA. In the case
of the reclassification of depreciable property, an additional
unintended benefit would occur because, unlike CCA claims, CEE
and CDE claims do not result in a reduction of the resource
allowance deduction available to taxpayers in the resource
sector.
The proposed amendments are intended to
clarify the policy underlying the income tax law. Any necessary
action will be taken to ensure that the right of parties involved
in outstanding court cases to make arguments on the basis of the
existing income tax law is not affected. However, the changes
would prevent other taxpayers form seeking to benefit from the
perceived deficiency in the existing law.
More detailed information on the proposed
amendments is contained in the attached draft legislation and
explanatory notes.
[34] Evidently the
appellants believed that their rights were better protected if
they were "parties involved in outstanding court cases
...". It is not my place to second-guess their
judgement. Moreover no justification is necessary.
[35] Taxpayers may have
many reasons for objecting to an assessment based on their own
filing. They may wish to leave the year open in case there is a
change in the law as the result of an anticipated court ruling or
legislative change. It is not necessary to explore the reasons
for their doing so. It is sufficient that the Income Tax
Act gives them the right to object to or appeal from an
assessment whatever may be the basis of the assessment or the
grounds of objection.
[36] The second contention
is that the right to object to and appeal from an "as filed
assessment" is inconsistent with the Minister's right to
perform an audit. I shall not dwell at length on the argument
beyond observing that it is a non sequitur. The Minister
is free to perform audits of a taxpayer during the period in
which an appeal is outstanding. If he chooses to reassess or to
issue additional assessments in that period the taxpayer may file
a notice of objection and start the process over or he may amend
the existing notice of appeal by referring to the new
reassessment. The Crown's argument that the appellants may
not raise in an objection or appeal points that are inconsistent
with positions taken in their own return would have as much force
if the objections were made to assessments issued after a full
audit as they do if the objections were made to "as filed
assessments."
[37] The third argument is
that an appeal from an "as filed assessment" is not one
in respect of which this court has jurisdiction. It is wholly
inappropriate to use the word jurisdiction in this context.
Obviously this court has exclusive jurisdiction to hear appeals
from assessments under the Income Tax Act.
[38] Counsel for the
respondent argues that there is no way a taxpayer can protect
itself from errors in its own returns other than, perhaps,
relying upon the Minister's leniency in accepting amended
returns and assessing so as to permit the taxpayer to object if
the Minister refuses to give effect to the amended return. There
is no mechanism whereby the Minister can be compelled to accept
an amended return or to act upon it if he chooses not to. I do
not share counsel's faith in the Minister's magnanimity
in voluntarily accommodating a taxpayer's requests to amend
its returns. A taxpayer's legal right to compel reassessments
lies in the objection and appeal process.
[39] The Crown's
position in these motions seems to demonstrate a belief that the
Income Tax Act and all of the reporting, auditing and
assessing procedures under it exist for the convenience of the
Government and that anything that interferes with its orderly
procedures is implicitly prohibited. I do not see it that way.
Nor am I prepared to accept the dire predictions of fiscal chaos
that may result if I dismiss these motions and allow Inco and
Imperial Oil to file notices of objection and appeal from
assessments based on their own returns. The respondent's
stated concerns that the whole self-assessing and audit system
will collapse in disarray are, in my view, hyperbolical.
[40] Mr. Chambers
submits that this court has the inherent jurisdiction to control
its own process. I agree. The point is self-evident.
[41] The next argument is
that to permit the taxpayer to file an objection to and appeal
from an assessment based on its own filing deprives the Minister
of the benefit of the reverse onus of pleading assumptions.
[42] I shall refrain from
commenting on the somewhat peculiar logic that lies behind this
remarkable contention and shall observe only that in proceeding
in the manner chosen by the appellants they have taken on a much
heavier burden than they would have if they were merely seeking
to demolish pleaded assumptions. They must establish every
constituent element of their entitlement. The reverse onus
created by the pleading of assumptions does not exist primarily
for the benefit of the Crown. If the assumptions on which
assessments are based are honestly, fully and accurately pleaded
by the respondent this is of much greater benefit to the
appellant because it defines what facts the appellant must
establish and what need not be.
[43] However lest it be
suggested that I have not done full justice to the Crown's
contention I shall set out in full the written argument on this
point.
[44] Paragraphs 96 to
104 of the respondent's written argument in Inco read:
96. The
self-assessment system in Canada necessarily requires that the
Minister's assessment be initially based solely upon facts
relayed to the Minister by the taxpayer. The facts material to
the assessment are peculiarly within the knowledge of the
taxpayer. As a practical matter, the Minister's knowledge of
the taxpayer's affairs is extremely circumscribed and is
normally almost entirely dependent upon the taxpayer's
cooperation.
97. This
disparity in information between the taxpayer and the Minister
manifests itself into the unique procedural rule that if the
Crown alleges that the Minister assumed a fact in the assessment
process, that fact is presumed to be true and it is up to the
taxpayer to demolish that fact in court.
98. This
effectively creates a reverse onus. This is a form of negative
inference drawn by the courts as a matter of public policy where
the facts are peculiarly within the knowledge of the taxpayer -
not the Minister. In order to effectively know the case that the
Minister must meet, the Minister must have an opportunity to
verify the facts asserted by the taxpayer. Tax litigation is
unique in the disparity in information known to each party in the
absence of an audit by the Minister. The most effective method
for confirming this information is the audit process described in
the Act and not the examination for discovery process.
99. To
allow the Appellant to appeal from an As Filed Assessment to the
Tax Court of Canada prior to the conclusion of an audit would
preclude the Minister from being able to plead assumptions of
fact and take the benefit of the reverse onus. Indeed this would
effectively put the onus of showing what is in effect the
Appellant's own assessment is wrong on the Minister. Put
another way, the Minister would in effect be called upon to prove
that which he does not know to be wrong. In the Respondent's
submission, this would put the appeal process, as it has been
known in Canada since at least the Second World War, on its
head.
100. Furthermore, in
keeping with the principles of self-assessment the Minister has
relied on the Appellant's representation in its income tax
return that the taxable income and tax payable has been correctly
calculated and reported. Hence if the Appellant's appeal were
allowed to proceed, the result would be that in relying on the
representation the Minister acted to his detriment. In the
Respondent's submission, this is a classic case of estoppel
and prejudice which the Court should not countenance.
101. In order to
assure a fair hearing the Court would at a minimum have to permit
the Respondent to conduct what would in effect be an audit of the
claims raised by the Appellant in its Notice of appeal through
the litigation process. In the Respondent's submission, this
would be to the Minister's prejudice, because it would
deprive him of his statutory right to conduct audits in the most
efficient manner in the time frame which Parliament has allowed
him. Furthermore, this could entail the consequence that such
isolated audit might be less thorough than it would be if it were
conducted in the context of the totality of the Appellant's
business dealings. The determination of the specific claims
raised by the Appellant in its Notice of Appeal does not depend
solely on facts which the Appellant may choose to highlight, but
must be determined by reference to the Appellant's business
transactions viewed in their totality.
See: Respondent's Submissions, p. 14, paras. 40 and
41.
102. Last, but not
least, there is, in the Respondent's submission, the distinct
danger of the Minister, and indeed the government's treasure,
being prejudiced by the potential applicability of the res
judicatadoctrine, were the Appellant's appeal allowed to
proceed.
103. Since an appeal
is an appeal from the amount of tax assessed, there is a distinct
danger that future courts might find that any matter affecting
the computation of the tax payable for a particular taxation year
is "related" to that tax payable and cannot be
litigated more than once. In that event, the process engaged by
the Appellants would prejudice the Minister in that it would
effectively preclude the Minister from issuing a reassessment
with respect to that taxation year after the Court's judgment
is issued.
See: Chevron Canada Resources
Ltd. v. The Queen,
98 DTC 6570, at 6578, para. 36 (F.C.A.)
104. The Respondent
submits that any debate as to whether the res judicata
doctrine would or would not apply in the present case, if the
Minister issued a reassessment for the 2000 taxation year after
the pronouncement of the Court's judgment regarding the
Appellant's appeal, does not diminish this distinct danger,
the risk of which actually materializing the Respondent should
not be called upon to shoulder.
[45] I do not find these
arguments persuasive. The taxpayers are prepared to assume the
burden of proving their entitlement. The Crown's concern that
it may be deprived of some perceived procedural advantage by not
being able to plead "assumptions" is no reason to
strike out an appeal by a taxpayer. The onus is a substantive one
and exists as a matter of law. This is clear from the judgment of
Rand J. in Johnston v. Minister of National Revenue,
3 DTC 1182 at 1183.
[46] The idea that somehow
a reassessment might be precluded by the doctrine of res
judicata is barely even a theoretical possibility. In the
extremely unlikely event that the problem were to arise in the
future it could be dealt with. One does not strike out appeals on
the basis of hypothetical and remotely conjectural
eventualities.
[47] The Attorney General
of Canada can deal with the appeals at the same time as the CCRA
is proceeding with the audit. The existence of an outstanding
appeal does not curtail or limit in any way the Minister's
powers under the Income Tax Act.
[48] Once it is concluded
that the appellants have the right to appeal from assessments
based upon their own returns it must inevitably follow that the
appeals are not frivolous or vexatious or an abuse of the
court's process. They raise justiciable issues over which the
court has jurisdiction and the appellants are entitled to have
them determined by the court.
[49] The motions to strike
out the appeals are therefore dismissed.
[50] The alternative relief
sought is an order that the appeals be stayed until the
Minister's audit of Inco's 1997 to 2000 years is
completed and it has been decided whether to reassess those
years. The years in the case of Imperial Oil are 1998 and 1999.
The respondent is asking that the appeals be held in abeyance
while the Minister completes his audit for several years, not all
of which are the subject of the appeals. To stay a proceeding is
an extraordinary discretionary remedy and it must be based upon
compelling reasons. None have been put forward. This court's
function is to serve the interests of justice, not the
convenience of the Minister of National Revenue. The two are not
necessarily the same.
[51] The motions are
dismissed with costs.
Signed at Toronto, Canada, this 14th day of
February 2003.
A.C.J.
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