One minute with Laura Poots, barrister at Pump Court Tax Chambers.
What’s keeping you busy at work?
I’ve had a busy summer of advice on a whole range of topics (landfill tax, partnership taxation and forestry land to name a few). Now things are getting busy on the litigation front. I’ve got two weeks in Edinburgh for a First-tier Tribunal hearing on NICs, and then appeal hearings on a variety of different issues – VAT and pensions tax in the Upper Tribunal, and salaried members legislation in the Court of Appeal (BlueCrest [2023] EWCA Civ 1481).
What do you know now that you wish you’d known at the start of your career?
The work that you particularly enjoy might change across your career, and you shouldn’t be afraid of trying to change the balance of your work. At the beginning of my career I was very focused on advisory work, but later realised I wanted to do more litigation, and it took me a while to work up the courage to develop that aspect of my practice. Now I am very happy with the balance between the two, and the skills you develop in advisory work are really useful in litigation (and vice versa).
Also, ask for advice (whether you’re brand new or you’ve been doing this for years). My colleagues are very generous with their time, and I learn so much from discussing problems with them.
If you could make one change to a tax, what would it be?
I would welcome clear rules on which litigation documents might be disclosed to third-parties, and when, in tribunal proceedings. A consultation by the Civil Procedure Rule Committee is already under way for proceedings covered by the CPR, and it would be helpful to see clear rules in the tax tribunals.
This is an area which has generated lots of case law in recent years (for example, see the recent application by Stewarts Lawin the case of Osmond & Allen v HMRC [2024] UKFTT 414 (TC)), and clarifying the position would help everyone involved in litigation. It is perhaps particularly important for potential appellants, given that tax appeals often involve commercial information and appellants will want to understand the risk of that information being shared.
Has a recent case caught your eye?
Wired Orthodontics Ltd v HMRC [2024] UKUT 266 (TCC) is a decision on an oral application to the Upper Tribunal (UT) for permission to appeal (PTA). I believe this is the first decision to be published under the UT’s new policy on publication of decisions to refuse permission following an oral renewal hearing. This is a really positive step in allowing all advisers and potential litigants to understand when litigation has come to an end, and also to see the reasoning behind the UT’s PTA decisions.
Wired Orthodontics is also interesting because the UT made a decision on a separate application, concerning disclosure of communications between a solicitor and an expert witness, in 2021 ([2021] UKUT 318 (TCC). That 2021 decision has only just been published, because the judge directed that it should not be published until the end of the substantive proceedings – a creative and interesting way of ensuring that the reasoning is ultimately published, without affecting the substantive proceedings.
You might not know this about me but...
Until 2021, I was a Special Constable (a volunteer police officer), based in Southwark at Peckham Police Station. I loved being a part of a totally different aspect of London life and seeing the law in action from another perspective. Now that I’ve ‘retired’, I have a slight obsession with reading police non-fiction books – two recent recommendations are Into the Night: A Year with the Police (Matt Lloyd-Rose) and Off the Beat (Nusrit Mehtab).
One minute with Laura Poots, barrister at Pump Court Tax Chambers.
What’s keeping you busy at work?
I’ve had a busy summer of advice on a whole range of topics (landfill tax, partnership taxation and forestry land to name a few). Now things are getting busy on the litigation front. I’ve got two weeks in Edinburgh for a First-tier Tribunal hearing on NICs, and then appeal hearings on a variety of different issues – VAT and pensions tax in the Upper Tribunal, and salaried members legislation in the Court of Appeal (BlueCrest [2023] EWCA Civ 1481).
What do you know now that you wish you’d known at the start of your career?
The work that you particularly enjoy might change across your career, and you shouldn’t be afraid of trying to change the balance of your work. At the beginning of my career I was very focused on advisory work, but later realised I wanted to do more litigation, and it took me a while to work up the courage to develop that aspect of my practice. Now I am very happy with the balance between the two, and the skills you develop in advisory work are really useful in litigation (and vice versa).
Also, ask for advice (whether you’re brand new or you’ve been doing this for years). My colleagues are very generous with their time, and I learn so much from discussing problems with them.
If you could make one change to a tax, what would it be?
I would welcome clear rules on which litigation documents might be disclosed to third-parties, and when, in tribunal proceedings. A consultation by the Civil Procedure Rule Committee is already under way for proceedings covered by the CPR, and it would be helpful to see clear rules in the tax tribunals.
This is an area which has generated lots of case law in recent years (for example, see the recent application by Stewarts Lawin the case of Osmond & Allen v HMRC [2024] UKFTT 414 (TC)), and clarifying the position would help everyone involved in litigation. It is perhaps particularly important for potential appellants, given that tax appeals often involve commercial information and appellants will want to understand the risk of that information being shared.
Has a recent case caught your eye?
Wired Orthodontics Ltd v HMRC [2024] UKUT 266 (TCC) is a decision on an oral application to the Upper Tribunal (UT) for permission to appeal (PTA). I believe this is the first decision to be published under the UT’s new policy on publication of decisions to refuse permission following an oral renewal hearing. This is a really positive step in allowing all advisers and potential litigants to understand when litigation has come to an end, and also to see the reasoning behind the UT’s PTA decisions.
Wired Orthodontics is also interesting because the UT made a decision on a separate application, concerning disclosure of communications between a solicitor and an expert witness, in 2021 ([2021] UKUT 318 (TCC). That 2021 decision has only just been published, because the judge directed that it should not be published until the end of the substantive proceedings – a creative and interesting way of ensuring that the reasoning is ultimately published, without affecting the substantive proceedings.
You might not know this about me but...
Until 2021, I was a Special Constable (a volunteer police officer), based in Southwark at Peckham Police Station. I loved being a part of a totally different aspect of London life and seeing the law in action from another perspective. Now that I’ve ‘retired’, I have a slight obsession with reading police non-fiction books – two recent recommendations are Into the Night: A Year with the Police (Matt Lloyd-Rose) and Off the Beat (Nusrit Mehtab).
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