Taxpayers who erroneously record an agreement in a manner that (per the erroneous documentation) would cause unintended tax consequences to arise may find relief in the equitable remedy of rectification. Rectification is discretionary; when it is awarded, a rectification order is granted by a court on the basis that a document inaccurately reflects the true original agreement of the parties with the order having effect nunc pro tunc (i.e. retrospectively or retroactively) as of the date of the original agreement. The retrospective effect of a rectification order is binding for tax purposes. However, in Anderson v. Benson Trithardt Noren LLP  2015 SKQB 123, affirmed by 2016 SKCA 120, (Anderson) ^[1] while the Court rectified documents recording a section 85 rollover, the Court refused to declare that its order was retrospectively binding for tax purposes. Confused? Anderson provides both a cautionary tale of the importance of diligently implementing even the most vanilla tax planning and a thought- provoking discussion of rectification in the tax context.

Section 84.1 of the Income Tax Act (Act), in its current form, was introduced in 1985 (concurrent with the introduction of the capital gains deduction), and the provision has always been a source of heartburn for planners. It is a very broad anti-avoidance rule that tries to prevent surplus from being stripped from corporations as a tax-free capital distribution, rather than a taxable distribution in the form of dividends. In order for section 84.1 to apply, there needs to be a transfer of shares of a corporation by an individual or trust to another corporation with which the individual does not deal at arm’s length, and immediately after the disposition, the purchaser corporation and the corporation whose shares are being transferred are connected. While the Act deems related persons to not deal at arm’s length, it also states that it is a question of fact whether persons who are not related to each other are, at a particular time, dealing with each other at arm’s length. If section 84.1 applies, then the otherwise tax-free return of surplus in the form of capital distributions will be turned into a taxable distribution in the form of dividends.

On June 13, 2016, the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) released its Economic Survey of Canada. There were some interesting comments and criticisms about Canada’s overall economy. However, as it relates to small business taxation, the following quote should be noteworthy for Canadian private client tax advisors.