B.C. Supreme Court grants tax appeal from producer of Confessions of a Sociopathic Social Climber

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      A B.C. Supreme Court judge has awarded $145,600 to a film company after federal authorities applied federal and provincial tax credits inconsistently.

      Confessions Productions appealed a 2012 ruling by the Appeals Division of the Minister of National Revenue, which determined that the company was ineligible for this money from the provincial government.

      The company applied for the funds in connection with the 2005 TV movie Confessions of a Sociopathic Social Climber.

      It was directed by Dana Lustig and starred Jennifer Love Hewitt.

      According to the B.C. Supreme Court ruling by Justice Barry Davies, the Canada Revenue Agency and minister of national revenue allowed credits under the Federal Tax Act.

      But the tax authorities refused credits available under the British Columbia Tax Act.

      That was because they allowed a "deemed" date of the filing for federal credits, but refused to do the same for the provincial credits.

      Davies concluded that the difference in the two assessments "arose from the refusal" of the B.C. Ministry of Finance to allow the filmmaker's application for the provincial sales tax credit.

      "It took that position notwithstanding that the Province had accepted an administrative fee of $5,500 to process the Appellant’s application for a BC PSTC Certificate in substitution for its earlier BC Basic Credit application and did so after the expiry of the statutory time limit for eligibility for the alternative credit sought upon which limitation period it then relied in refusing to allow the BC PSTC," Davies wrote.

      Davies noted that "there is no substantive difference between the limitation dates" in the federal and provincial tax legislation, nor is there any "materially substantive difference between the prescribed forms".

      The only differences were communications between Confessions Productions and B.C. Film and the company's communications with the Canadian Audio-visual Certification Office.

      Comments

      1 Comments

      Andy Wilson

      May 27, 2014 at 3:05pm

      Anything for a click - JLH boob shot for the click - well done