With the GAAR now in effect, are certain features of registered pension schemes now within its ambit, asks John Hayward.
Under the former discretionary tax approval regime which existed until 5 April 2006 pension schemes that were involved in tax avoidance would either not have received tax approval or would have had their tax approval withdrawn as they would have failed the sole purpose test in ICTA 1988 s 590(2)(a) that a ‘scheme must be bona fide established for the sole purpose of providing relevant benefits’. This discretionary test went out of the window under the statutory pensions tax regime established from 6 April 2006 by FA 2006 Part 4 but surely it could not have been mere coincidence that the disclosure of tax avoidance scheme (DOTAS) regime was introduced almost...
