Guindon: SCC Hearing Scheduled for December 5, 2014

The highly-anticipated appeal to the Supreme Court of Canada in Guindon v The Queen has been scheduled for hearing on December 5, 2014, and the parties have now filed their factums in the appeal.

For our prior posts on this decision, refer to our summary of the Tax Court decision ( 2012 TCC 287), our guest blogger's summary of the Federal Court of Appeal decision (2013 FCA 153), and our summary of the Supreme Court leave application ( Docket No. 35519).

The Appellant's (Ms. Guindon's) Factum is available here, and the Respondent's (Crown's) Factum is here.

The appeal concerns the "third party" penalties under section 163.2 of the Income Tax Act. In short, the Tax Court found that the penalty imposed under section 163.2 is a criminal penalty, not a civil one, and therefore subject to the protection of (inter alia) section 11 of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

The Federal Court of Appeal reversed on the basis that Ms. Guindon did not provide notice of a constitutional question, and thus the Tax Court lacked jurisdiction to make an order on the nature of section 163.2. In any event, the Federal Court of Appeal also stated that the penalty under section 163.2 was not criminal in nature, and hence, was not subject to Charter protections.

Taxpayer's Arguments

On appeal to the Supreme Court, the Ms. Guindon has framed her appeal as follows: based on the Supreme Court's decisions in...