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'Double-tax' international haulier must pay £5,500

5th May 1994, Page 23
5th May 1994
Page 23
Page 23, 5th May 1994 — 'Double-tax' international haulier must pay £5,500
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Which of the following most accurately describes the problem?

• A haulier told Bury magistrates that British international hauliers were being taxed twice, in mitigation of a series of offences.

Michael Turta, trading as Walmersley Haulage, of Heywood Street, Bury, was ordered to pay fines, back duty and costs totalling £5,514 after he admitted a series of offences connected with the operation of his international haulage business.

During the hearing Turta told magistrates that in addition to paying vehicle excise duty in this country, hauliers have to pay sim

ilar taxes abroad. He pleaded guilty to four offences of using a vehicle without a vehicle excise licence; five offences of using a vehicle when a higher rate of excise duty was payable; seven offences of using a vehicle without an 0-licence; one offence of using a vehicle without a current test certificate; and nine offences of failing to produce tachograph records.

Prosecuting for the DOT, John Heaton said that an investigation began in August 1993.

One vehicle had been taxed as a recovery vehicle, at £75 a year, instead of the fee for a 38-tonne artic. It was the prosecution case that these offences were specimen ones, and there had been many more undetected offences, said Heaton.

Defending, John Backhouse said Turta carried for Nedlloyd in Austria. Vehicles visiting Austria had the choice of paying the full Austrian tax rate for the year or making a payment every time they entered the country. Turta chose to do the latter, and the payments he made roughly equated to £3,500 per vehicle per year.

Provisions that would enable operators to reclaim excise duty for the time vehicles spent abroad had never been brought into force, said 13ackhouse. As a result international hauliers were pay ing tax twice or three times. Turta felt that was unfair and put him at a considerable commercial disadvantage compared with foreign hauliers. He decided to tax the lorry concerned at the lowest rate possible in this country. He was now faced with paying backduty for a period when the majority of the vehicle's time was spent abroad and when foreign taxes had been paid.

The magistrates fined Turta £3,600, and ordered him to pay a total of £1,764.56 back-duty with £150 costs.

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Locations: Bury

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