High Court Rules NPPR IS Tax-Deductible


How can you get around paying NPPR penalties? It's impossible. As you said yourself you knew about it and didn't pay it. We debated this on here and as far as I'm aware the conclusion is there was no lee way.
 
Bronte said:
How can you get around paying NPPR penalties? It's impossible. As you said yourself you knew about it and didn't pay it. We debated this on here and as far as I'm aware the conclusion is there was no lee way.
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I'm no legal expert but it would appear to me that the legality of the vicious NPPR penalties (amounting to an interest rate of 10% per month) might well be open to challenge in the courts on the grounds that they infringe rights on foot of being excessively harsh.

There have been stories of local authorities agreeing to mitigation of these penalties in individual cases and such mitigations may well have been sanctioned to avert the appalling vista for the State of the entire NPPR penalty regime being found illegal in the courts.
 
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Well gentlemen and ladies, I will keep you posted. I'll quite happily take it to Europe. The penalties were set with spurious abandon-I have yet to receive a Bill for any of the years 2009 to 2013 nor indeed the courtesy of a receipt from the LA. I work with the LA in question and have no hesitation going down the road I have embarked on. I look forward to my refund being spent most likely in the UK or lodging to my uk account on a date with favourable rates. Lone star is not done yet.
 
There is difference in 'didn't pay' V 'couldn't pay'. No one knows anyone's situation as well as themselves. It was food V NPPR....
 
Lonestar there was never a bill sent to any of us. I just paid it online and you print it out as proof of payment. That's your receipt. It's the same for the property tax. I get no bill. I pay it in the revenue system and you then print it off when the payment goes through and that's your receipt.

I see no refund coming for you on any grounds.

And the fact you couldn't pay is neither here nor there.

Tommy I fail to see how your argument that the penalties were excessively harsh would be a legal argument to get the penalties waived.
 
Tommy I fail to see how your argument that the penalties were excessively harsh would be a legal argument to get the penalties waived.
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It's hardly unprecedented for a court to waive or set aside a penalty imposed on an individual for a stated offence on the grounds that its imposition would be excessively harsh and/or disproportionate to the offence?
 
Well - I'll eat my words if I'm rejected. But I'm quite prepared to take the state on in this matter. A precedent has already been set. I'm actually quite looking forward to feather ruffling!
 
T McGibney said:
It's hardly unprecedented for a court to waive or set aside a penalty imposed on an individual for a stated offence on the grounds that its imposition would be excessively harsh and/or disproportionate to the offence?
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If it's as simple as this then don't you think it's amazing nobody has taken a case. The penalties were set by the legislature, I'd be amazed if the courts went against it.
 
If it's as simple as this then don't you think it's amazing nobody has taken a case. The penalties were set by the legislature, I'd be amazed if the courts went against it.
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The cost of mounting a court challenge can be prohibitive and the whole experience can be daunting so people generally shy away from it but it's by no means uncommon for the courts to set aside legislative sanctions and penalties whenever they are challenged.
 
That is not proving what you are saying. The Independed mentions a challenge, not a case won. The FJ says this:

In a recent landmark case against the Department of Agriculture, farmer Michael O'Connor was awarded entitlements held in penalties from what was described as a "procedurally flawed" inspection.

This is not that the penalties infringe rights because they are harsh (your words earlier as grounds)

But that because the procedures of inspection were flawed, ie carried out incorrectly, then it follows the penalties cannot follow.

If I thought there was a ghost of a chance when I was helping a relation years ago in relation to selling a property, that I had warned them to pay the NPPR for, totally ignored of course, and were then faced with paying thousands I would have challenged it.
 
Bronte said:
That is not proving what you are saying. The Independent mentions a challenge, not a case won.
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The Irish Independent links I provided refer to 2 separate cases. The IFJ link does indeed mention that the State is to challenge the result of one of these cases, as happened in the Tax Appeals case on the NPPR tax deduction.

Bronte said:
This is not that the penalties infringe rights because they are harsh (your words earlier as grounds)
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Of course unfair or unduly harsh penalties infringe rights. That is precisely why they can be judicially contested under common law.
 
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I intend to be an example. and have no fear taking it through the courts and to Europe
After what a particular bank put me through - I can do anything!
 
From the RTE report -

In a Dáil reply to Mr McGrath, Minister for Finance Michael Noonan said Revenue would not be paying refunds while the High Court decision was under appeal.

Minister Noonan added the right to claim back money was subject to a "statutory limit of four years from the end of the chargeable period to which the claim relates".

Mr McGrath said: "It seems that the State's strategy is to wind down the clock so as to deny property owners the tax refund they are now legitimately due arising from the High Court decision".
 

I don't see how that can be said to be the strategy; the case is in the public domain and anyone who wishes to do so can make a claim now, just as they could all the way along - they just won't be paid it until the case is concluded.
 
torblednam said:
I don't see how that can be said to be the strategy; the case is in the public domain and anyone who wishes to do so can make a claim now, just as they could all the way along - they just won't be paid it until the case is concluded.
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The vast majority of people won't be motivated to make a retrospective claim for deduction until they know for certain that it will be honoured. Many people have a deep-seated fear of Revenue and won't want to make speculative claims.
 
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