Income Tax (Earnings and Pensions) Act 2003

Meaning of “associate”: trustees of employee benefit trust

15 (1) This paragraph applies for the purposes of paragraph 14(1)(c) (meaning of “associate”: trustees of settlement) where the individual is interested as a beneficiary of an employee benefit trust in shares or obligations of the company mentioned in paragraph 11(2).

(2) The trustees of the employee benefit trust are not to be regarded as associates of the individual as a result only of the individual’s being so interested if neither—

(a) the individual, nor

(b) the individual together with one or more of the individual’s associates, nor

(c) any such associate, with or without any other such associates,

has at any time after 13th March 1989 been the beneficial owner of, or been able (directly or through the medium of other companies or by any other indirect means) to control, more than 25% of the ordinary share capital of the company.

(3) In sub-paragraph (2)(b) and (c) “associate” has the meaning given by paragraph 14(1), but does not include the trustees of an employee benefit trust as a result only of the individual’s having an interest in shares or obligations of the trust.

(4) Chapter 11 of Part 7 of this Act (which deals with the attribution of interests in companies to beneficiaries of employee benefit trusts) applies for the purposes of sub-paragraph (2).

(5) In this paragraph “employee benefit trust” has the same meaning as in that Chapter (see sections 550 and 551).