Matalan chief loses £800,000 CGT battle

Former Matalan chief executive Angus Monro has lost a claim to be repaid more
than £800,000 in overpaid taxes.

Monro overpaid £846,000 in capital gains tax on the sale of more than £5m
worth of the company’s shares.

Monro had overpaid for the tax year 1998/1999. But under a later judgment,
handed down in December of 2002, it became clear that he could have claimed
further deductions against his capital gain to reduce his tax bill.

Monro tried to claim that he had paid too much under a ‘mistake of law’ but
the claim was rejected yesterday by the Court of Appeal on the grounds that his
original calculation had been ‘generally accepted practice’ at the time.

The former Matalan chief had tried to argue that his case was similar to
European tax cases, where tax was overpaid tax due to UK rules being
inconsistent with European single market principles.

But HMRC said there was a difference between it claiming tax unlawfully, and
someone filing their return under accepted principles which were then changed
following further court cases.

Further Reading:

Read the
Court of Appeal’s judgment

Report
on the High Court judgment