UT (Tax & Chancery) UT-2024-000044 - [2025] UKUT 00094 (TCC)

We accept that the precise percentage of an individual’s income that is attributed to one source would not have been known at the commencement of a contract and is therefore not a matter that can properly be taken into account and as such the FTT erred in law. The precise percentage of income the contracts represented would not have been known to Sky at the outset of the contracts in 2013 and 2015 but Sky would have known that this was Mr Thompson’s only broadcasting contract and he only had a specified number of other work commitments. Sky would have known the extent of the other work commitments Mr Thompson was likely to be performing outside the contracts and the number of other clients (for instance, the FTT found he was also doing tours of LFC).

Therefore, the error by the FTT on specific percentage of income was not material because the degree of financial dependency that Mr Thompson had upon Sky during the currency of the contract is a relevant factor: Barnes UTat [98]. By analogy with the Upper Tribunal’s finding in that paragraph, Sky would have had an understanding of Mr Thompson’s business interests outside his work for Sky and an awareness that he was significantly dependent upon it as the one paymaster for the exploitation of his talents, rather than deriving significant income from varied sources. That was consistent with employment.