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On July 11, 2019 on the website of the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) the opinion of Advocate General Kokott in the joined Cases C-469/18 (IN versus Belgische Staat) and C-470/18 (JM versus Belgische Staat) (ECLI:EU:C:2019:597), was published.
Is a Member State implementing Union law if its tax authorities use, for an income tax assessment, evidence that the investigating authorities obtained after the discovery of a VAT carousel? In other words, does a breach of fundamental rights of the European Union when gathering evidence lead to a prohibition on the use of evidence in the context of an income tax assessment? These are essentially the questions that the Court of Justice has to consider by means of two requests for a preliminary ruling from the Belgian Court of Cassation.
The questions are asked against the background of criminal investigations in the context of which Luxembourg transferred evidence to Belgium in breach of a provision stipulating judicial authority provided for in an international agreement. This evidence was used at least for the income tax assessments. It is only these assessments that are contested by the appellants in cassation in the main proceedings (‘the appellants in cassation’).
The matter at issue is therefore the application of the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union (‘the Charter’) — Article 47 of the Charter in this case — in the context of income tax assessment. This matter goes beyond the much-discussed Åkerberg Fransson judgment from 2013. In that judgment, the Court ruled that criminal proceedings regarding VAT fraud serve to ‘implement … Union law’ within the meaning of Article 51(1) of the Charter. It is now necessary to examine whether the assessment of income tax serves to implement Union law if evidence that was obtained during a pre-trial investigation initiated due to suspicion of VAT fraud is used.
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On July 11, 2019 on the website of the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) the opinion of Advocate General Pitruzzella in the Case C-400/18, Infohos versus Belgische Staat (ECLI:EU:C:2019:607), was published.
Does an independent group of persons that comprises a number of Public Centres for Social Welfare, to which the group provides services of public interest, lose its VAT-exempt status with regard to the services which it provides to those members if it decides also to provide services to third parties?
That is, in essence, the question raised by the Belgian national court, which is asking the Court of Justice to assess the compatibility with EU law of a provision of national law which makes a VAT exemption for independent groups of persons that comprise Public Centres for Social Welfare subject to the condition that they provide services exclusively to members.
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From the list of Members of the Inclusive Framework on BEPS as available on the website of the OECD it can be concluded that Bosnia and Herzegovina is the latest jurisdiction that joined the Inclusive Framework on BEPS. Therewith the total number of jurisdictions that have joined the Inclusive Framework on BEPS comes to 131.
Read more: Bosnia and Herzegovina joined the Inclusive Framework on BEPS
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On July 10, 2019 the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) judged in Case C‑273/18, SIA ‘Kuršu zeme’ versus Valsts ieņēmumu dienests (ECLI:EU:C:2019:588).
This request for a preliminary ruling concerns the interpretation of Article 168(a) of Council Directive 2006/112/EC of 28 November 2006 on the common system of value added tax (OJ 2006 L 347, p. 1), as amended by Council Directive 2010/45/EU of 13 July 2010 (OJ 2010 L 189, p. 1) (‘the VAT Directive’).
The request has been made in proceedings between SIA ‘Kuršu zeme’ and the Valsts ieņēmumu dienests (tax authorities, Latvia) (‘the VID’) concerning the latter’s refusal to allow the right to deduct value added tax (VAT) on acquisitions of goods made by that company from the company SIA ‘KF Prema’, on the ground that those acquisitions did not in fact take place.
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In the Dutch Staatscourant of June 28, 2019 a Decree of the Dutch State Secretary of Finance of June 19, 2019 was published. The Decree gives substance to the policy intentions on the renewed ruling practice which the State Secretary announced in his letter of November 22, 2018. The Decree applies from July 1, 2019. In this article we will discuss a few elements of the Decree.
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