| Employment Income: Deductions and Expenses |
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there were at least two places of work. Travel to England could not therefore be dismissed as travel from home to a place of work. |
Lord Reid, however, gave a rather different account of Owen v Pook.31 He considered that the distinguishing fact in Owen was that O had been in part—time employment, and that it had been impossible for the employer to fill the post otherwise than by appointing someone with commitments that could not be given up. It was therefore necessary that whoever was appointed should incur travelling expenses. This approach goes much wider than any pronouncement in recent years and undermines both the decision of the House of Lords in Ricketts v Colquhoun and much of the practice of the Revenue. It followed that the expenses were deductible because T was the only person who could do this job which he was only willing to do from Canada, and that he did some of the work in Canada. |
The question arises how far Lord Reid’s approach undermines the earlier decision in Ricketts v Colquhoun. No member of the majority in Taylor v Provan wished to question the result of that earlier decision but Ricketts’ post as Recorder of Portsmouth was part time and anyone appointed would, at that time, have had to be a member of the Bar. However, Ricketts was not the only member of the Bar who could have been appointed and it was possible that another appointee would have lived in Portsmouth. Another explanation supporting the older case could be that Rickett’s home was not a place of work. This would conclude the matter, if as may well be the case, 32Lord Reid’s explanation of Owen v Pook rested on the assumption that there were two places of work. |
18A.2.2.1 An Alternative Explanation—Itinerants |
The explanation of Owen v Pook and Taylor v Provan may not be that home was one of the places of work, but that in each case their employment was, in a sense, itinerant. In Owen v Pook there was no reason why the employment should have been located in O’s home. What mattered was that he assumed responsibility for the patient when he received the telephone message. If he was out with friends for the evening and had given their |