Restitution is due

The long-running group litigation order case concerned the recovery of corporation tax and advance corporation tax (ACT) levied contrary to EU law. The issues for determination included the methods for the calculation of the unlawful tax under TA 1988 s 18 (sch D case V) and the unlawful ACT and whether the taxpayers were entitled to restitution.

Mr Justice Henderson in the High Court delivered a lengthy judgment of 471 paragraphs.

He said “The EU principle of effectiveness requires the claimants to be given a remedy under national law which reimburses the whole of the unlawfully levied ACT”.

He added that the claimants should be compensated “for the loss which they sustained by the payment of that tax. Viewed from the claimants’ perspective their loss includes at a minimum the amounts of unlawful tax which they paid”.

It was...