Pavage St-Eustache Ltée v. Canada (Attorney General), 2015 FC 477

• Judge: Gagné, J.
• Court: Federal Court (Canada)
• Case Date: February 24, 2015
• Jurisdiction: Canada (Federal)
• Citations: 2015 FC 477;(2015), 479 F.T.R. 298 (FC)

Pavage St-Eustache v. Can. (A.G.) (2015), 479 F.T.R. 298 (FC)

MLB headnote and full text

[French language version follows English language version]

[La version française vient à la suite de la version anglaise]

.........................

Temp. Cite: [2015] F.T.R. TBEd. AP.049

Pavage St-Eustache Ltée (demanderesse) v. Procureur général du Canada (défendeur)

(T-1581-13; 2015 CF 477; 2015 FC 477)

Indexed As: Pavage St-Eustache Ltée v. Canada (Attorney General)

Federal Court

Gagné, J.

April 16, 2015.

Summary:

Pavage St-Eustache Ltée applied for judicial review of a decision by the Canada Revenue Agency, wherein the Agency allowed only part of its request for relief under s. 220(3.1) of the Income Tax Act. The Agency refused to cancel or waive the interest payable on a notice of reassessment for the 1996 tax year, dated May 26, 2004, that had accrued from that date. The application raised the following question: "Did the Agency take into consideration the entire file before concluding that it had not made an error in the handling of the applicant's file, and that no undue delay could be attributed to it?"

The Federal Court allowed the application, and referred the file to another representative of the Agency for reconsideration.

Income Tax - Topic 7803

Returns, assessments, payment and appeals - Interest - Waiver - The applicant corporation applied for judicial review of a decision by the Canada Revenue Agency, wherein the Agency allowed only part of its request for relief under s. 220(3.1) of the Income Tax Act (waiver of penalty and interest) - The Agency refused to cancel or waive the interest payable on a notice of reassessment for the 1996 tax year, dated May 26, 2004, that had accrued from that date - The applicant submitted that neither it nor its counsel received a copy of the notice of reassessment before the end of 2008 - It also pointed to a number of errors made by the Agency in its handling of the file - The Federal Court allowed the application - The application raised the following question: "Did the Agency take into consideration the entire file before concluding that it had not made an error in the handling of the applicant's file, and that no undue delay could be attributed to it?" - The issue was one of mixed fact and law, to be reviewed under the standard of reasonableness - In light of all the evidence, it was not reasonable for the Agency to conclude that it had not made any errors in the handling of the applicant's file without analyzing the evidence against it - The Agency could not simply ignore all of the circumstances and conclude that there was no error on its part - It must weigh all of the evidence and assess the impact of the errors it made on the applicant's position - See paragraphs 22 to 31.

Income Tax - Topic 7824

Returns, assessments, payment and appeals - Penalties - Waiver - [See Income Tax - Topic 7803 ].

Income Tax - Topic 9204

Enforcement - General - Fairness legislation (incl. standard of review) - [See Income Tax - Topic 7803 ].

Cases Noticed:

Bozzer v. Minister of National Revenue et al. (2011), 418 N.R. 377; 2011 FCA 186, refd to. [para. 17].

Counsel:

Lise Gagnon, for the applicant;

Louis Sébastien, for the respondent.

Solicitors of Record:

Pateras & Iezzoni Inc., Montreal, Quebec, for the applicant;

William F. Pentney, Deputy Attorney General of Canada, Montreal, Quebec, for the respondent.

This judicial review application was heard at Montreal, Quebec, on February 24, 2015, before Gagné, J., of the Federal Court, who delivered the following judgment and reasons, dated April 16, 2015.