The taxpayer was the sole designated beneficiary of two RRSPs held by her husband at his death in 2007. When his estate failed to pay an assessment respecting his 2006 year, the Minister assessed the taxpayer for the same amount under s. 160(1). In finding that this transfer after her husband’s death constituted a transfer to the deceased’s spouse (so that the s. 160(1) assessment was valid), Graham J noted that
- although dictionary definitions and the legal meaning of spouse “clearly contemplate a relationship between two living people” (para. 22), “people routinely use the word ‘spouse’ to refer to the surviving member of a coupled” (at para. 23),
- some (but not all) provisions referred to “spouse” to mean a widow or widower (ss. 146(8.91) and 70(6)) or to be inclusive of widows and widowers (ss. 72(2) and 148(8.2)), and
- the alternative interpretation “would absurdly provide relief only to those individuals whose spouses had failed to comply with the tax system during their lifetimes” - and given that “transfers of property to widows and widowers under a will are clearly caught by subsection 160(1)” (para. 74), such a system would “irrationally…only provide relief if a tax debtor had a RRSP” (para. 72).
He noted that using the colloquial meaning of "spouse" was not necessarily transferable to other provisions with a different context and purpose (para. 79).