Uppal – Tax Court of Canada infers Ministerial acceptance of late HBP withdrawals because CRA only challenged them on another ground

The taxpayers, after purchasing a home in December 2020, withdrew from their RRSPs in reliance on the home buyers’ plan (HBP) rules in both 2021 and 2022. Whether the 2022 withdrawals were eligible amounts turned on the s. 146.01(2)(d) rule, which would have deemed the 2022 withdrawals to have been made at the end of 2021 (and, to therefore, be eligible amounts) if those withdrawals were made in January 2022 “or at such later time in the year as [was] acceptable to the Minister.”

In rejecting the Minister's position that s. 146.01(2)(d) did not apply on the basis that there were insufficient funds in their RRSPs on December 31, 2021 to fund the withdrawals, Sorensen J. stated that s. 146.01(2)(d) was a deeming rule that, therefore, was “unconstrained by reality, including whether there was a positive account balance at prior year-end”.

That left the question as to whether their withdrawals in 2022 (which occurred after January 2022) were "acceptable to the Minister." In imputing such acceptability, Sorensen J indicated that he could infer that the 2022 date of the second withdrawals was not a problem for the Minister, as no Ministerial objection had been stated in any of the materials properly put before him, nor was there any properly admissible evidence of “any purported exercise of Ministerial discretion” to find the 2022 withdrawal dates unacceptable.

Neal Armstrong. Summary of Uppal v. The King, 2025 TCC 103 under s. 146.01(2)(d).