Language of document :

Action brought on 1 April 2019 – European Commission v United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland

(Case C-276/19)

Language of the case: English

Parties

Applicant: European Commission (represented by: A. X. P. Lewis, J. Jokubauskaitė, Agents)

Defendant: United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland

The applicant claims that the Court should:

declare that by introducing new simplification measures that extend the zero-rating and the exception to the normal requirement of keeping Value Added Tax records provided for by the original Terminal Markets Order 1973 without applying to the Commission with a view to seek the Council’s authorisation, the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland has failed to fulfil its obligations under Article 395 (2) of Council Directive 2006/112/EC1 of 28 November 2006 on the common system of value added tax (“VAT Directive”);

order the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland to pay the costs.

Pleas in law and main arguments

On 28 December 1977, the United Kingdom notified special measures including the Value Added Tax (Terminal Markets) Order 1973 that permits commodity futures to be traded on certain markets in the United Kingdom free of VAT and of the recording requirements of VAT subject to certain conditions.

The Value Added Tax (Terminal Markets) Order 1973 was amended several times to add to its scope a number of commodities markets that were not listed in the original notification.

The Commission claims that the amendments made to the Value Added Tax (Terminal Markets) Order 1973 enlarge the scope of the original derogation that the United Kingdom had notified in 1977. They should consequently have been notified to the Commission pursuant to Article 395 (1) of the VAT Directive but they were not.

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1 OJ 2006, L 347, p. 1.