Northumbria Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust v R & C Commissioners

JurisdictionEngland & Wales
JudgeAsplin,Green,Falk
Judgment Date27 February 2024
Neutral Citation[2024] EWCA Civ 177
CourtCourt of Appeal (Civil Division)
Northumbria Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust
and
Revenue and Customs Commissioners

[2024] EWCA Civ 177

Before Lady Justice Asplin, Lord Justice Green and Lady Justice Falk

COURT OF APPEAL

VAT not applicable to car-parking charges levied by NHS healthcare facilities

The Court of Appeal so held in allowing the appeal of Northumbria Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust from a decision of the Upper Tribunal (Tax and Chancery Chamber) (Mrs Justice Bacon and Judge Jonathan Cannan)([2022] UKUT 267 (TCC)) which had affirmed a decision of the First-tier Tribunal (Tax Chamber) (Judge Greg Sinfield)([2021] UKFTT 71 (TC)) that the Revenue and Customs Commissioners (HMRC) were entitled to charge VAT to parking charges it levied.

Michael Firth, directly instructed, for the NHS trust; Howard Watkinson for HMRC.

LADY JUSTICE FALK said that the NHS trust challenged HMRC's view that VAT was chargeable on car-parking levies that it made at its hospitals and made a claim for the repayment of the output tax that it said it had wrongly accounted for over a three-year period between 2013 and 2016.

The VAT at stake in the present appeal was relatively limited, but about 50 similar appeals by other NHS bodies were stayed behind it. The total tax at stake for past periods was in the region of £70 million. There were three preliminary points to be made: First, the topic of hospital carparking charges was one that had engendered strong views and controversy. The court was not concerned with the merits of that debate.

Second, the NHS trust's claim to recover VAT did not extend to revenue generated in situations where the management of car parking was outsourced to a third-party operator. The court was concerned only with situations where the NHS trust operated...

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