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CJEU - Case C-276/12 / Judgment

Jiří Sabou v Finanční ředitelství pro hlavní město Prahu.
Policy area
Taxation
Deciding body type
Court of Justice of the European Union
Deciding body
General Court (Grand Chamber)
Typ
Decision
Decision date
22/10/2013
ECLI (European case law identifier)
ECLI:EU:C:2013:678

Charta der Grundrechte der Europäischen Union

Title VII: General provisions

Article 51 - Field of application

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  • CJEU - Case C-276/12 / Judgment
    Key facts of the case:
     

    ‛Directive 77/799/EEC — Mutual assistance by the authorities of the Member States in the field of direct taxation — Exchange of information on request — Tax proceedings — Fundamental rights — Limit on the scope of the obligations of the requesting and the requested Member States towards the taxpayer — No obligation to inform the taxpayer of the request for assistance — No obligation to invite the taxpayer to take part in the examination of witnesses — Taxpayer’s right to challenge the information exchanged — Minimum content of the information exchanged.

    Outcome of the case:

    On those grounds, the Court (Grand Chamber) hereby rules that:

    1. European Union law, as it results in particular from Council Directive 77/799/EEC of 19 December 1977 concerning mutual assistance by the competent authorities of the Member States in the field of direct taxation and taxation of insurance premiums, as amended by Council Directive 2006/98/EC of 20 November 2006, and the fundamental right to be heard, must be interpreted as not conferring on a taxpayer of a Member State either the right to be informed of a request for assistance from that Member State addressed to another Member State, in particular in order to verify the information provided by that taxpayer in his income tax return, or the right to take part in formulating the request addressed to the requested Member State, or the right to take part in examinations of witnesses organised by the requested Member State.
    2. Directive 77/799, as amended by Directive 2006/98, does not govern the question of the circumstances in which the taxpayer may challenge the accuracy of the information conveyed by the requested Member State, and it does not impose any particular obligation with regard to the content of the information conveyed.
  • Paragraphs referring to EU Charter

    20) The referring court is unsure whether a taxpayer has a right to take part in exchanges of information between the authorities under Directive 77/799, and is uncertain to what extent fundamental rights, as guaranteed by the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union (‘the Charter’), have any bearing on the existence of that right.

    ...

    23) As a preliminary point, the European Commission submits that, by its questions relating to the procedural rights of the taxpayer in circumstances where the tax authorities have decided to make use of the mutual assistance procedure under Directive 77/799, the referring court is seeking to determine whether the taxpayer has certain rights under the Charter. According to the Commission, in actual fact those questions concern, in part, the application of the Charter in conjunction with national law, and the Court therefore has no jurisdiction to reply to those questions.

    ...

    25) First, as regards the Charter, it must be pointed out that, as it came into force on 1 December 2009, it does not apply to the assistance procedure which led to the additional notice of assessment of 28 May 2009.