How Tax 'Time-bomb' Could Undermine Assisted Suicides Paul Beckett pinpoints financial pitfall for offshore tax

residents planning assisted dying One of the most divisive issues of our times, assisted suicide is defended and opposed with equal vehemence, and moral, ethical and legal arguments all fuel the debate over the right to 'self-determination'. Now, it has come to light that, for offshore tax residents at least, there could also be heavyweight fiscal arguments to consider. Paul Beckett turns a spotlight on the issue of how relocation to Switzerland for an assisted suicide could lead to a hefty, unforeseen tax bill. If you relocate from the UK to the Isle of Man to take up residence, you are only eligible for taxation in your domicile of choice - the Isle of Man. However, if you should then leave the Isle of Man for Switzerland with the sole intention of carrying out an assisted suicide, then the Isle of Man - to which you are clearly not returning - is no longer your domicile of choice. For Switzerland to become your new domicile of choice, you would need to be resident there for a minimum of one year. In this limbo, your default domicile for taxation purposes becomes your domicile of origin that is, the UK. The impact on a lifetime's careful savings could be considerable, not to mention the consequences for family left behind. It is an issue which has not previously come under scrutiny, yet an enquiry lodged with HMRC appears to confirm this interpretation, with a spokesman responding, "If it could be shown that he [the hypothetical client] had abandoned his domicile of choice, it may be that at his date of death, either Switzerland could be his new domicile of choice or, more likely, his domicile of origin would be reinstated".

While euthanasia has been decriminalised in a number of European countries, encouraging or assisting anyone to kill themselves remains outlawed in the UK under the Suicide Act 1961. In the Isle of Man the corresponding provisions are found in Section 2(1) of the Criminal Law Act 1981: 2(1) A person who aids, abets, counsels or procures the suicide of another, or an attempt by another to commit suicide, shall be guilty of an offence and shall be liable, on conviction on information, to imprisonment for a term not exceeding fourteen years.

Information available on the Dignitas website shows that between 1998 and 2011, the Dignitas clinic in Zurich assisted the suicides of 182 people from the UK, and 1,298 in total: http://www.dignitas.ch/images/stories/pdf/statistik-ftbjahr-wohnsitz-1998-2011.pdf . Paul Beckett 10 September 2012 The following as a smaller text footnote: Paul Beckett, a practising Catholic, is openly opposed to assisted suicide, citing the tenet on euthanasia ("morally unacceptable") within the Catechism of the Catholic Church as the articulation of his personal belief. He also believes that the availability of assisted suicide is symptomatic of the rise of an individualist mind set which is gradually eroding community-orientated thinking, and that it "sets a precedent of moral indifference. While he acknowledges that many people will hold equally strong counterarguments, he hopes that the taxation issue may prove a disincentive for some or at the very least, food for thought.