TC09595 - [2025] UKFTT 00894 (TC)

Fecha: 12-Jun-2025

Evidence

Evidence

In addition to an electronic hearing bundle comprising 2,260 pages, we heard from the following witnesses for APL:

(1)

Dean Barnett, the Director of Business Operations for the airline and academy training business L3 Harris CTS Airline and Academy Training Ltd (“L3 A&AT”). He is employed by L3 Harris Commercial Training Solutions Limited (“L3 CTS”), the parent of L3 A&AT. Before taking up his current position in 2019, Mr Barnett was, from 2016, the Commercial and Contracts Manager and was responsible for the contracts relevant to the Sponsored Training Programme (which is described below).

(2)

Alan Whittaker, the Global Pilot Selection and Placement Manager for L3 A&AT, a role he has help since September 2016. He is involved in the process of selecting cadets with a view to them being placed with an airline but was not involved in the drafting of the sections of the recruitment material dealing with the security bond.

(3)

Robin Glover-Faure, who, from 2019, has been the Vice President of Sales and Marketing of L3 Harris’s Commercial Aviation Solutions Sector which includes L3 Harris’s airline academy and pilot training business (owned by L3 A&AT), the manufacture and sale of pilot training systems and software (a business owned by L3 CTS)), and the provision of flight data analysis services (a business owned by L3 Harris Flight Data Services Limited (“L3 FDS”)). Between 2016 and 2019 he focussed on sales and marketing for L3 A&AT. Mr Glover-Faure is a director of L3 CTS, L3 A&AT and L3 FDS. He is also a director of APL.

(4)

Sarah Lockett, who gave evidence by video-link from New Zealand, was employed as the base support manager by L3 CTS Airline Academy (NZ) Limited (“L3 NZ”), a New Zealand subsidiary of L3 A&AT which provided flight training in New Zealand for cadets.

(5)

Charlotte Buckingham, the Head of Commercial for L3 A&AT and L3 data analytics business. She is responsible for negotiating contracts, putting together template agreements, dealing with the cadets’ contracts and, more generally, for legal compliance. Between 2013 (when she first joined the L3 group) and 2019 Ms Buckingham held a similar role in which she was also responsible for the template agreements, but reported to the Head of Commercial.

We found all of APL’s witnesses to be credible, straightforward and helpful who did what they could to assist the Tribunal, albeit with a slight reluctance common to all, to accept or agree with matters put to them in cross-examination that appeared to support HMRC’s, rather than APL’s, case.

It was agreed to reserve issues of quantum of the assessment (with any party at liberty to apply to the Tribunal for directions to resolve these issues if they could not be agreed). As such, although the witness statement of HMRC Officer Miranda Widger had been included in the hearing bundle and was admitted in evidence, she was not required to attend for cross-examination.