Case information

Taxation — Income tax — Reassessment — Waiver of normal reassessment period — Normal reassessment period ended on Sunday — Waiver received by Minister on following day — Whether Interpretation Act, R.S.C. 1985, c. I-21, s. 26, applies to deem waiver to have been filed within normal reassessment period — Whether taxpayer acquires any enforceable legal right under Income Tax Act, R.S.C. 1985, c. 1 (5th Supp.), s. 152(4)(a)(ii) — Whether taxpayer obliged to file waiver — Whether s. 152(4)(a)(ii) imposes time limit on taxpayer for filing waiver.

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In 2012, the Minister of National Revenue assessed Ms. Csak’s taxes under s. 160 of the Income Tax Act, R.S.C. 1985, c. 1 (5th Supp.). Ms. Csak appealed the assessment.

In 1993, Ms. Csak’s husband had transferred real property valued at $950,000 to her for no consideration. At the time, he owed unpaid tax and interest for the 1988-1991 taxation years. Ms. Csak challenged the assessment on the basis, inter alia, that the underlying reassessments for her husband’s 1988 and 1989 taxation years were statute-barred, so Ms. Csak could not have derivative liability for those years. For the 1989 taxation year, the normal reassessment period ended on May 30, 1993, a Sunday. The deceased executed his waiver on May 27, 1993, and it was received on May 31, 1993.

The Tax Court judge found that the 1988 reassessment was statute-barred. The reassessment of the deceased’s 1989 taxes was also statute-barred because s. 26 of the Interpretation Act, R.S.C. 1985, c. I-21, which provides that “[w]here the time limited for the doing of a thing expires or falls on a holiday, the thing may be done on the day next following that is not a holiday”, did not apply. The Court of Appeal allowed the Minister’s appeal and referred the assessment of the deceased’s 1989 taxation year back to the Minister for reconsideration and reassessment on the basis that s. 26 applied and that the reassessment was not statute-barred.