Northumbria Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust (appellant) v HM Revenue & Customs (respondent)
Tuesday 6 – Wednesday 7 February 2024
By appellant’s notice filed on 16 December 2022 the appellant, appeals the order of Upper Tribunal (Tax and Chancery Chamber) dated 6 October 2022, whereby she dismissed the appeal against the decision of the First tier Tribunal (“FTT”).
The FTT had dismissed the appeal of the applicant NHS Trust against HMRC’s determination that VAT was chargeable by the Trust on its supplies of car parking at hospital and healthcare sites. On the basis of that determination, HMRC refused to repay VAT accounted for by the Trust during the periods 05/13 to 03/16. The appeal to the UT involved whether the Trust is a taxable person when making supplies of car parking in car parks at its hospitals, as the FTT found, or whether in so doing it is acting as a public authority pursuant to Article 13 of the Principal VAT Directive 2006/112/EC (PVD) as implemented by section 41A of the Value Added Tax Act 1994. That in turn raises two questions: first, whether the Trust’s supplies of car parking are made pursuant to a “special legal regime” applicable to the Trust, which is not applicable to private economic operators; and secondly, if so, whether treating the Trust as a non-taxable person would lead to a significant distortion of competition. The UT found that the FTT did not err.
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