Tax & Trade Blog

After 35 years of practice in Tax and Trade, one thing I am sure of is that there are no “magic” answers for dealing with administrative delay by the Canada Revenue Agency (“CRA”) or the Canada Border Services Agency (“CBSA”).  

A recent decision of the Canadian International Trade Tribunal (“CITT”) underscores this problem, and leaves taxpayers and importers in some potentially hard situations when faced by governmental inaction.

A couple of recent cases in the Federal Court of Appeal (“FCA”), which saw the taxpayer and importer, respectively, attempting to appeal earlier Court decisions, have emphasized that tax and trade litigation is a “one-shot deal”, where taxpayers (and importers on the trade side) are required to put their best foot forward in the lower Courts, and will be unlikely to get a second chance at making arguments before the FCA (or the lower Courts) if they do not do so.

Doostyar v. Canada

Doostyar v. Canada was a tax case, appealed to the FCA, in which the taxpayer’s position was that the Tax Court of Canada (“TCC”) erred by not accepting its additional submissions, post hearing.

As we have previously written here and here, a taxpayer’s debts can be imposed on their spouse or children through an assessment under section 160 of the Income Tax Act (“ITA”).  The Federal Court of Appeal has now drawn a line in the sand limiting the reach of such assessments with respect to the spouse of a tax debtor.

In Enns v. The King, 2025 FCA 14, the Court held that a survivor ceases to be the spouse of a deceased taxpayer for the purposes of section 160 of the ITA.  While the ruling is a win for survivors, it leaves open the question of how far the CRA’s assessment powers under section 160 may extend.

As we blogged on here, CRA has recently taken steps to reverse what was generally understood to have been their historical position on employer eligible ITCs in pension plan situations involving insurance segregated fund products.

In a recent Excise News Publication, CRA doubles-down on this position in a very public way, seemingly setting the stage for audits in this area to come.

Beginning this year, digital platform operators should be aware of the new tax reporting requirements under section 292 of the Income Tax Act (“ITA”).  Many reportable digital platforms (including many online “gig” platforms) will now be required to file reports with the CRA providing information about the activities of their “reportable sellers”.  Filings for the 2024 year are due by January 31, 2025!

Which Platform Operators are Affected?

The new requirements target a subset of “platform operators”, which under section 282 of the ITA include websites or applications that contract with sellers to use all or part of a platform to connect with customers.