The Gazette 1977

GAZE1TE

DECEMBER1977

on the construction of this portion of the paragraph must also fail. Accordingly the appeal must succeed. It must be held, in my view, that the plaintiff has failed to establish under s.56 the right of appropriation sought by her. Whether she is otherwise entitled to the dwellinghouse is a matter that must await the outcome of the pending appeal in the partition suit. S.56(11) of the Succession Act, 1965, requires all proceedings in relation to s.56 to be heard in chambers. This does not mean that the judgment in such proceedings in chambers may not be published: see per Lord Denning M.R. in Wallersteiner v. Moir 1974 3 All E.R. 217 at P. 229. The decision in this appeal is being given in court rather than in chambers so that the opinion of the Court as to the correct interpretation of s.56(5Xb) may be promulgated. However, - in order to preserve the confidentiality inherent in the requirement of a hearing in chambers, all identifying facts and circumstances, including the names of the parties, are omitted from this judgment. H. v. H.—Supreme Court (Henchy J., Griffin J. and Parke J.)—unreported—13th May, 1977. The Society has been advised by the Revenue Commissioners that, where a Member has been instructed to deal with the matter in this way, Inspectors of Taxes and their staffs will be glad to co-operate in order to arrange prompt settlement of the liability (granted normal delays, particularly where an election is made to base the computa- tion on market value at 6 April 1974 rather than on time apportionment) and to arrange for the issue of an official receipt for tax paid even though the year of assessment may not yet have expired. Members so instructed should communicate with the Inspector who normally deals with the Income Tax affairs of the vendor as soon as possible after the contract for sale has been signed. 17 November, 1977.

discharge the onus of proof by establishing one or other of two things namely, that the exercise of the right would be unlikely to diminish the value of the assets or to make them more difficult to dispose of in the course of administration, but that such an applicant was not obliged to establish that both consequences would follow. He submitted that in a case such as the present, wheré no sale of the assets is contemplated, the fact that the exercise of the right might diminish the value of the assets was irrelevant and that the exercise of the right would in no way impede the personal representative in distributing the assets in due course of administration. This was the view taken by the trial judge who interpreted the word "them" as meaning "the assets of the deceased other than the dwellinghouse" and the word "dispose" included voluntary distribution amongst the beneficiaries in specie. I regret that I cannot accept these conclusions. Reading the paragraph in its entirety it seems to me clear that what the subsection requires the court to be satisfied of is that neither of the specified eventualities is likely to happen. In my opinion the submissions on behalf of the plaintiff CAPITAL GAINS TAX SINGLE TRANSACTIONS In reply to queries raised by the Society, the following statement has been issued by the Revenue Commissioners Under section 5 of the 1975 Act, Capital Gains Tax is charged by reference to a year of assessment ending on the fifth day of April and the tax falls due for payment within three months after the end of the year of assessment or at the end of two months after the date of making the assessment whichever is later. This procedure is designed to secure that all gains accruing within the year are aggregated and that any allowable losses are deducted so that normally only one composite assessment is made for a particular year. It happens in many cases, particularly in relation to land and/or buildings sold as an entirety, that there is only one disposal in the course of a year and that this situation can reasonably be anticipated at the time the single disposal is being finalised. The vendor in that type of case may wish to have any Capital Gains Tax Liability arising agreed and paid at the time the sale is being closed, so that he may receive the net consideration free of any further liability for this tax on the particular transaction and avoid having a demand for payment served on him some time after the event.

PRACTISING CERTIFICATES

At the Council Meeting on 16th December, 1977, the Council of the Society voted unanimously to strongly recommend that the fees payable for the annual Practising Certificatre for an assistant solicitor should be payable by the employer on 6 January, in any year (being thr statutory date of issue of the Certificate). James J. Ivcrs, Director General.

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