Estate Planning

A spousal trust, by definition is a trust that must pay or make payable all of its income to the spouse beneficiary on an annual basis. Nevertheless, there may be a good reason to have the income taxed in the spousal trust. The spouse beneficiary may have in a given year, sufficient income from other sources such that an income designation from the spousal trust may not provide the intended….

Today’s blog was written by Katie Ionson. The Tax Court of Canada’s decision in Brent Kern Family Trust v. R was released on October 17, 2013. Brent Kern is the first reported case to apply the watershed decision of the Federal Court of Appeal (the “FCA”) in R. v. Sommerer, which was released in 2012. The case is unusual in that the normal positions of the parties were reversed: the….

Happy New Year. I write this blog at the end of 2013 while we have power. What I mean is we have power back after 4 days without. We were one of the lucky ones- without heat or hydro for only 4 days. Our phones and internet are still not working. We were also very fortunate to be able to stay with friends. For the many older individuals who live….

Looking back at 2013, I’ve been reminded daily of the economic weight of philanthropy. The reminders are the large-format ads that run in The Globe and Mail. Being a reader of print edition I’ve noticed that the biggest advertisers on many days are “institutional” charities — especially publicly-funded universities and hospital foundations. Some days the majority of the full-page ads are from these charities. They are celebrating gifts, donors, and….