Christian beekeepers who shun computers win landmark David and Goliath battle with HMRC by gaining right to file VAT return by post

Owners of Cornish Moorland Honey company refuse to use the internet
Graham and Abigail Blackburn members of Seventh Day Adventist Church
Tax tribunal ruled that by refusing to allow them to file returns by post HMRC violated their human rights to freely express their religion

PUBLISHED: 11:45 EST, 21 October 2013 | UPDATED: 13:28 EST, 21 October 2013

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In what many will view as a victory for a simpler way of life, staunchly religious beekeepers who shun computers, televisions and mobile phones have scored a landmark triumph over the tax authorities.

Graham and Abigail Blackburn, who run Cornish Moorland Honey, in Bodmin, Cornwall, fiercely objected when Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs (HMRC) demanded that the file their VAT returns online.

The couple, as devout members of the Seventh Day Adventist Church, are convinced that Christ’s second coming is imminent and view the internet as an intrusion of ‘worldliness’ into their lives of ‘righteousness’.

A tax tribunal ruled HMRC had violated the human rights of Seventh Day Adventist beekeepers Graham and Abigail Blackburn by refusing to allow them to file their VAT returns by post

Now, in a major embarrassment for HMRC, a tax tribunal has ruled that its treatment of Mr and Mrs Blackburn violated their human rights.

Mr Blackburn told the first-tier tribunal that he and wife abjure the use of computers, the internet, televisions and mobile phones in their home.

The contents of some TV programmes and websites were ‘contrary to the Bible’s teachings’ in his view and he wanted to ‘protect his children from bad influences’.

The beekeeper said people were obsessed by their mobile phones - treating them as ‘idols’ - and that the flood of electronic communications had ‘blinded the minds of non-believers’, giving them no time for religion in their lives.

Most businesses have been required by law to file their VAT returns online since April last year, and HMRC lawyers argued that the couple’s stance was ‘really a personal preference and not part of their religion.’

The beekeepers, who run Cornish Moorland Honey, refuse to use the internet or watch TV (file picture)

Philip Woolfe, for the tax authorities, pointed out that the Seventh Day Adventist Church does not ban its members from using the internet - merely extoling them to avoid ‘unwholesome’ or ‘sordid’ influences in the mass media - and in fact has its own website.

However, Tribunal Judge Barbara Mosedale ruled that by refusing to exempt Mr and Mrs Blackburn from online filing, HMRC had breached their right to freely manifest their religion, enshrined in Article 9 of the European Convention on Human Rights.

She said the couple’s decision not to use computers was more than just a preference to keep ‘bad’ content out of their home and away from their children but was an expression of their fundamental religious beliefs.

She said: 'I find that, by entirely shunning computers, the Blackburns considered they were acting, as the Bible required them to do, in accordance with their religious conscience.

'They were manifesting their religious beliefs by refusing to use computers.'

Justifications put forward by HMRC for refusing to exempt the couple were ‘clearly insufficient’, she concluded.