Decision 2007/250 - 2007/250/EC: Council Decision of 16 April 2007 authorising the United Kingdom to derogate from Article 193 of the VAT Directive - Main contents

EN

Official Journal of the European Union

L 109/42

In a letter registered by the Secretariat-General of the Commission on 10 February 2006, the United Kingdom requested authorisation to introduce a special measure derogating from Article 21(1)(a) of the Sixth Council Directive 77/388/EEC of 17 May 1977 on the harmonisation of the laws of the Member States relating to turnover taxes — Common system of values added tax: uniform basis of assessment (2).

In accordance with Article 27(2) of Directive 77/388/EEC, the Commission informed the other Member States by letter dated 18 July 2006 of the request made by the United Kingdom. By letter dated 19 July 2006, the Commission notified the United Kingdom that it had all the information it considered necessary for appraisal of the request.

Directive 77/388/EEC has been recast and repealed by Directive 2006/112/EC. References to the provisions of the former are to be construed as references to the latter.

The person liable for payment of the value added tax (VAT), under Article 193 of Directive 2006/112/EC, is the taxable person supplying the goods. The purpose of the derogation requested by the United Kingdom is to place that liability on the taxable person to whom the supplies are made, but only under certain conditions and exclusively in the case of mobile telephones and computer chips/microprocessors.

Within that sector, a significant number of traders engage in tax evasion by not paying VAT to the tax authorities after selling the products. Their customers, however, being in receipt of a valid invoice, remain entitled to a tax deduction. In the most aggressive forms of this tax evasion, the same goods are, via a ‘carousel’ scheme, supplied several times without payment of the VAT to the tax authorities. By designating in those cases the person to whom the goods are supplied as the person liable for the VAT, the derogation would remove the opportunity to engage in that form of tax evasion. However, it would not affect the amount of VAT due.

For the purposes of ensuring the effective operation of the derogation and preventing the tax evasion from being shifted to other products or towards the retail level, the United Kingdom should introduce appropriate control and reporting obligations. The Commission should be informed of the specific measures adopted, and the monitoring and overall evaluation of the operation of the derogation.

The measure is proportionate to the objectives pursued since it is not intended to apply generally, but only to a specific high risk sector comprising certain carefully defined products in relation to which the scale and size of the tax evasion has resulted in considerable tax losses. Furthermore, since that sector is a small one, the derogation cannot be considered equivalent to a general measure.

The authorisation should be valid only for a short period, because it cannot be ascertained with certainty that the objectives of the measure will be achieved, nor can the impact of the measure on the functioning of the VAT system in the United Kingdom and in other Member States be gauged in advance; moreover, the impact of the measure and its implementation on the...