Taxes Consolidation Act 1997 section 574

Trustees of settlement

Section 574 sets out how trustees of a settlement are treated for capital gains tax purposes, including their status as a single body, their residence, and the recovery of unpaid tax from beneficiaries.

• Trustees of a settlement are treated as a single and continuing body of persons, distinct from the individuals who act as trustees from time to time, and are regarded as resident and ordinarily resident in the State unless a majority of the trustees are non-resident and the trust is administered outside the State.
• A professional trust manager (such as a bank or solicitor) is treated as not resident in the State in relation to a trust where all of the settled property was provided by a person who was not domiciled, resident, or ordinarily resident in the State at the relevant time.
• Where capital gains tax assessed on trustees remains unpaid six months after the due date and the relevant asset or sale proceeds are transferred to a beneficiary absolutely entitled, that beneficiary may be assessed in the name of the trustees within two years of the due date, up to the proportionate amount of tax.
• Where parts of settlement property are vested in different trustees or sets of trustees, they are treated as constituting a single body of trustees, even where they act separately.