[Sephiroth]

Originally Posted by jfman

I'm not being argumentative for the sake of it. An officer can only determine what they think is reasonable at the time, yes. However upon appeal, and in front of that jury, they would be asked to consider reasonable in the context that I put earlier in the thread. What an average person would expect to do.

This is established in Case Law. So for example in HMRC penalties cannot be avoided because someone claimed to be ignorant of VAT - that's not considered reasonable. A person of average intelligence would be aware of VAT.

However could someone avoid a penalty, or receive a different type, on the basis of being unaware of intricate parts of the law - so long as they took reasonable steps.

Which is what Cummings did (I would judge).