A J Frost:—This is an appeal from an income tax assessment in respect of the appellant’s 1968 taxation year. Upon notice of objection duly signed and filed, the Minister of National Revenue reconsidered the assessment and confirmed it on the ground that the $1,422.75 claimed as a deduction from income in respect of medical expenses did not fall within the meaning of paragraph 27(1 )(c) of the Income Tax Act. This appeal was heard at Toronto on October 28, 1971 by the Tax Appeal Board as it was then constituted.
The appellant’s child is suffering from childhood schizophrenia and is being treated in a normal school environment under the supervision of Dr W A Hawke of the Hospital for Sick Children, Toronto, and Mrs Joyce Jones, MA, a speech therapist. The child is not capable of responding to regular teaching methods. In-patient care was not considered suitable and would have cost upwards of $15,000 per year. The necessary services and procedures were arranged at Bayview Glen Junior Schools (hereinafter referred to as “Bayview”), an academic institution not licensed as a private hospital or nursing home. During the 1968 taxation year the appellant paid Bayview a tuition fee of $1,422.75.
The question before the Board is whether or not the tuition fee paid by the appellant to Bayview is a medical expense under the appropriate provisions of the Income Tax Act.
The appellant in his argument contended that the method adopted was recommended by two competent medical authorities and that no other form of treatment was available for his child in the community. Procedures and services were so arranged at Bayview that qualified medical practitioners could effect treatment, that such treatment was singular and necessary in the circumstances and that the tuition fee paid to Bayview should be regarded as a medical expense for income tax purposes.
Counsel for the respondent in his argument submitted that Bayview being an academic institution, and not a laboratory or centre for radiological or other diagnostic procedures, tuition fees paid to it could not be strictly construed as medical expenses. He referred, in particular, to Donald M Lawson v MNR, [1971] Tax ABC 833, wherein the appeal was dismissed on facts quite similar to those of the present case.
On the evidence, Bayview was the only place available where extensive care and treatment could be provided at a reasonable cost. Bayview, however, cannot be regarded as a “hospital” or “laboratory” in the ordinary sense and Parliament, in choosing the words “licensed private hospital”, clearly excluded academic institutions. At best, Bayview can only be regarded as a vehicle for prescribed medical services. Enrolment at Bayview may have been essential to the medical program adopted but the cost of enrolment does not become a medical expense within the meaning of paragraph 27(1 )(c) of the Income Tax Act.
During the hearing, the appellant raised a technical point, namely, that the Minister may not make a reassessment beyond the four-year limit from the date of mailing the notice of assessment unless the taxpayer has made a misrepresentation or committed a fraud. He claimed that the original assessment was issued on August 11, 1965 and as all subsequent assessments were based on identical terms of reference the power of the Minister to vary the basis of the original assessment expired four years later on August 11, 1969. The argument of the appellant was quite ingenious but not one with which the Board can agree, as the assessment issued on August 11, 1965 did not relate to the taxation year under appeal. As the language of the Act speaks of “dates” and “years” and not the bases of assessments, the Board can only conclude that Parliament intended each taxation year to stand on its own merits.
The Board is powerless to decide in favour of the appellant as the essential elements of the case do not fit within the provisions of paragraph 27(1 )(c) of the Income Tax Act.
Appeal dismissed.