In Isle of Wight Council and others v HMRC [2014] UKUT 0446 (15 October 2014) the UT found that local authorities had been correct to charge and account for VAT on the provision of off-street car parking.
This judicial saga started in 2006. The issue before the UT was whether the local authorities should have charged VAT on supplies of off-street car parking which depended on whether they were entitled to be treated as non-taxable persons in respect of their supplies of off-street parking. This in turn depended on whether non-taxation would lead to significant distortions of competition (Sixth VAT Directive art 4.5 now replaced by the Principal VAT Directive art 13).
The appellants contended that the FTT’s finding that the absence of taxation would reduce the upward pressure on prices was fatally wrong because it failed to take into account the Road Traffic Regulations...
