DEPUTY COMMISSIONER OF TAXATION OF THE COMMONWEALTH OF AUSTRALIA V. ACADEMY PLASTICS PROPRIETARY LIMITED

\ IN THE HIGH COURT OF AUSTRALIA

DEPUTY. COMMISSIONER OF TAXATION OF THE COMMONWEALTH OF AUSTRALIA

ACADEMY PLASTICS PROPRIETARY LIMITED

REASONS FOR JUDGMENT

Judgment delivered at... Sydney...

W. BM. Hovstox, Govt. Print. Me, on .Monday.,..26th March.1956..00.

c.s7a/38

DEPUTY COMMISSIONER _OF TAXATION OF THE COMMONWEATTH OF AUSTRALIA

ACADEMY PLASTICS PROPRIETARY LIMITED

JUDGMENT KITTO J.

This is an action by a Deputy Commissioner of Taxation against a manufacturer for the recovery of sales tax upon certain goods admittedly manufactured and sold in Australia by the defendant during the month of September 1952. It is common ground that the defendant was a registered person within the meaning of the Sales Tax Assessment Acts, the Sales Tax Procedure Acts and the Sales Tax Acts which were in force at the relevant time, and that none of the persons to whom the goods were sold was such a registered person. The arithmetical correctness of the amount sued for, which is £2.2.6, is admitted. The only i question for decision by the Court is whether the goods were exempt from sales tax as falling within one or more of the items ; in the First Schedule to the Sales Tax (Exemptions and Classi- fications) Act 1935-1952 (Commonwealth).

The goods in question are plastic articles, each branded "Tidy Towel Rack", which are intended to be used in pairs for the ° purpose of suspending towels in an extended position. Each article is constructed so as to be secured by means of two screws against a wall or other vertical surface. It presents to that surface a face which is roughly an 'inch and a half square. The face plate is about a quarter of an inch thick. From it, and at right angles to it, there projects horizontally, for a little over four inches, an arm an inch and a half in height and less than half an inch in thickness. From the lower edge of the arm three incisions lead upwards to within half an inch of the upper