Revenue and Customs v Charman & Anor

Documents and evidence produced under compulsion in financial remedy proceedings are protected from disclosure to third parties. Disclosure may be permitted exceptionally and rarely, for a very good or compelling reason. Relevance or usefulness to other proceedings, including tax proceedings, is insufficient by itself. The court must balance the public interest in tax collection against the public interest in preserving full and frank disclosure in family proceedings. A party relying on such material in other proceedings must disclose all relevant material, rather than selected passages.

HM Revenue and Customs applied for production of transcripts, witness statements, written submissions and other documents from earlier private financial remedy proceedings. HMRC intended to use them in the former husband’s pending appeal against tax assessments of approximately £11.5 million. The wife did not object, but the husband relied on the confidentiality attaching to material produced in the family proceedings.

The application was determined under rule 29.12 of the Family Procedure (Amendment) Rules 2012, with the earlier rules treated as having the same effect. The central issue was whether the material’s relevance and potential usefulness, together with the public interest in payment of the correct amount of tax, justified relaxing the general rule against disclosure.

1. Application dismissed. HMRC’s request for production of the family-proceedings documents was refused.
2. Rule 29.12 of the Family Procedure (Amendment) Rules 2012 required permission for inspection or copying of documents filed or lodged in the court office. The judge proceeded on the basis that the earlier rules had the same effect.
3. Documents and other evidence produced in financial remedy proceedings are generally not disclosable to third parties. Disclosure may be ordered only exceptionally and rarely, for a very good or compelling reason. Relevance or usefulness to other proceedings does not, without more, justify disclosure.
4. The discretion requires a balance between the public interest in payment of the correct amount of tax and the public interest in preserving full, frank and clear disclosure in financial remedy proceedings. That disclosure is fundamental to the court’s statutory duty to determine financial relief on complete and accurate information.
5. The circumstances were not rare or exceptional. There was no suggestion of tax evasion or criminal conduct; the tax appeal was a routine assessment appeal in which the husband bore the burden of proof; and HMRC already possessed the first-instance and appellate judgments.
6. If the husband wished to rely on material from the family proceedings, permission could be given. Any such reliance had to involve production of all relevant material, rather than selected passages favourable to his case.