ST. JOHN'S, N.L. - East Coast fishermen who say they paid too much tax on licence buyouts have won a Federal Court judgment that accuses the Canada Revenue Agency of unfair treatment.
Retired fisherman Victor White of Cotrell's Cove, N.L., led the challenge on behalf of more than 750 other fishermen from the province and Quebec's north shore.
The 29-page judgment released Monday could lead to thousands of dollars in repayments per case.
In the bluntly worded ruling, Judge Elizabeth Heneghan says the agency's Newfoundland and Labrador tax director, Wade Hiscock, "breached the applicant's right to procedural fairness" when he declined to review the case.
Hiscock's refusal to reconsider his agency's fluctuating tax treatment of different groups of fishermen "also fails to meet the standard of reasonableness," Heneghan concluded.
She ordered the matter be reviewed by "another decision-maker" and awarded costs to White.
The federal justice minister has 30 days to appeal.
At issue is how some fishermen paid much higher federal tax on their licence buyouts as the Canada Revenue Agency changed its direction for how the income should be treated -- as a capital gain or business income.
Lawyer Eli Baker, who represented the fishermen, said Tuesday it's a big win for Elizabeth Harvey of Isle Aux Morts, N.L.
Harvey worked for years to rally fishing families and challenge the taxes paid by her retired husband, Douglas, when he sold his groundfish licence in 1999. He would never have done it if he'd realized the taxes that would be clawed back, she said from Isle aux Morts, a tiny fishing community on Newfoundland's south coast.
"I'm like anybody on top of the world," she said of the judgment. "I hope I just stay up there. I hope I don't come down.
"My heart goes out to the families who lost their fathers because I wish they were here this morning to get the news."
