24.9.2011   

EN

Official Journal of the European Union

C 282/3

1.

Is the principle of tax neutrality (Article 9 of Council Directive 2006/112/EC (1) of 28 November 2006 on the common system of value added tax) infringed by a legal interpretation which prevents the addressee of an invoice from exercising his right to deduct where the operator who issued it has, prior to full performance of the contract or issue of the invoice, had his business operator’s licence withdrawn by the municipal authority?

2.

Can the fact that the individual operator who issued the invoice has not declared the workers whom he employs (who, as a result, work ‘in the black economy’), and the fact that, for that reason, the tax authority has found that the said operator ‘has no declared workers’, prevent the addressee of that invoice from exercising the right to deduct, having regard to the principle of tax neutrality?

3.

Can it be held that the addressee of the invoice is guilty of a lack of care when he does not verify either whether a legal relationship exists between the workers employed on a work site and the issuer of the invoice or whether the latter has fulfilled his tax-return obligations or any other obligations relating to those workers? Can it be held that such conduct constitutes an objective factor which demonstrates that the addressee of the invoice knew or ought to have known that he was participating in a transaction involving fraudulent evasion of VAT?

4.

Having regard to the principle of tax neutrality, can the national court take the above circumstances into consideration when its overall assessment leads it to the conclusion that the economic transaction did not take place between the persons specified on the invoice?