In 2007, as its contribution to the ongoing debate about the effect on the university presses of the new "public benefit" requirement of the 2006 Charities Act, Akme obtained and posted on the Internet the CUP's and OUP's numerous applications for tax exemption, which crucial privilege, after fifty years of rejection by the Inland Revenue, they were finally granted in 1976 and 1978. Now, under the 30-year rule, the IR file on the two presses' 1970s applications has just been released to the National Archive and again been posted by Akme.
The new documents display several oddities. First, the file is indexed as relating only to CUP (go to search and type in reference IR 40/19499), despite containing an IR instruction also to index it under OUP. Second, the papers were initially classified as "closed for 40 years", apparently bowing to a request made by CUP in 2008 for an extra 10-year embargo. When this was queried, an investigation resulted in the papers being declared now "open", but with certain words and passages in them being "redacted" by the Inland Revenue, that is, blanked out by computer. Third, the two presses' applications and various further IR documents are missing altogether. And fourth, the IR opinions feature a number of curious non-sequiturs and changes of mind. For example, an advisor who in 1976 asserted that OUP might already be trading "ultra vires", in 1978 concluded that, after all, its claim should not be opposed. Below are some of the documents' quotable quotes.
"It is also adduced in support of the claim [by CUP] that it was felt it might be unpatriotic in 1940 to oppose the Special Commissioners' [refusal] decision to the courts." IR letter from R. D. Rawson, 27th May 1976
"There now seems to be abundant and irrefutable evidence that CUP publishes only academic and educational books, learned journals, Bibles and prayer books, all of which are individually approved in advance, title by title, by the Syndics of the Press." Opinion of IR Solicitor J. S. Clarke, 4th November 1976, ¶3
"My own view is that CUP are trying it on... In my view the CUP has found that it was omitted to make a retrospection claim in the heat of battle over the basic claim to charity relief and it is now trying to railroad us into repaying another £[redacted] on no evidence at all. I recommend that we resist the claim." IR letter from W. B. Wilkinson, 11th January 1977
"A word should be said on the possibility of a favourable decision on the CUP establishing a precedent which others would seek to follow... The OUP was considered, and both its position vis-à-vis the University and its tax position are the same as those of the CUP. We do not have all the well-documented evidence that Cambridge has produced, but we know the Oxford Press is run on the lines of a commercial firm and no longer restricts its publishing to purely educational literature. Possibly, it is acting ultra vires in its trading. Its case, if it made one, for having its profits exempted would be much weaker than the Cambridge Press... I would not consider that exempting the trading profits of CUP would establish a precedent since the historic position of CUP and its present function is most uncommon." IR report on CUP by Betty McRobert, 17th May 1976, ¶6
"Although the OUP is a part of the university and subservient to the university's educational aims, the size of the trading carried on and its scope is such that it is almost a case of "the tail wagging the dog"... At present I think that the poise of the OUP is toward the publication of learned books, academic textbooks and mainly educational books. Provided therefore that the poise did not in the future change to more general commercial publishing, I think the OUP has made a case for exemption of its profits under S360(1)(e) ICTA 1970." IR report on OUP by Betty McRobert, 15th August 1978, ¶4
"I would not think it necessary to carry out reviews at all frequently of the [OUP's] publication lists to test for any movement in the poise." IR letter from E. A. Rapsey, 12th September 1978