CEDH · PRESS;GCJUDGMENTS;ENG — 12 juillet 2001

.s800EAC49 { font-size:12pt } .s5FFF0A77 { margin-top:0pt; margin-bottom:0pt; font-size:1pt } .sBB9EE52A { font-family:Arial } .sFE10DC93 { margin-top:0pt; margin-bottom:0pt; text-align:center } .s29100277 { font-family:Arial; font-weight:bold } .sA1D3DA2E { margin-top:0pt; margin-bottom:0pt; text-align:justify } .s94935B0F { width:389.85pt; display:inline-block } .s76CF415B { page-break-before:always; clear:both } .s32563E28 { margin-top:0pt; margin-bottom:0pt } .s4DDA3AA3 { font-family:Arial; font-weight:bold; font-style:italic } .s7ED160F0 { text-decoration:none } .s33165EBA { font-family:Arial; font-size:8pt; vertical-align:super; color:#0069d6 } .sADADF4A7 { font-family:Arial; text-decoration:underline } .sA36B60A1 { font-family:Arial; font-style:italic } .sCB27B9E { width:16.66pt; display:inline-block } .sC5412BEF { width:51.05pt; display:inline-block } .sF6A12959 { width:33%; height:1px; text-align:left } .s2EB42ED2 { margin-top:0pt; margin-bottom:0pt; font-size:10pt } .s3133A7C8 { font-family:Arial; color:#0069d6 }   EUROPEAN COURT OF HUMAN RIGHTS     524   12.7.2001   Press release issued by the Registrar   JUDGMENT IN THE CASE OF FERRAZZINI v. ITALY   In a judgment delivered at Strasbourg on 12 July 2001 in the case of Ferrazzini v. Italy, the European Court of Human Rights held by 11 votes to 6 that Article 6 (right to a fair trial) of the European Convention on Human Rights did not apply to the case before it and by 16 votes to 1 that the complaint under Article 14 (prohibition of discrimination) of the Convention was inadmissible.   1.     Principal facts   The applicant is an Italian citizen who was born in 1947 and lives in Oristano (Italy).   The applicant and another person transferred land, property and a sum of money to a limited liability company, A., which the applicant had just formed and of which he owned – directly and indirectly – almost the entire share capital and was the representative. The company, whose object was organising farm holidays for tourists, applied to the tax authorities for a reduction in the applicable rate of certain taxes payable on the above-mentioned transfer of property, in accordance with a statute which it deemed applicable, and paid the sum it considered due.   The present case concerns three sets of proceedings. The first concerned in particular the payment of capital gains tax and the two others the applicable rate of stamp duty, mortgage registry tax and capital transfer tax, and the application of a reduction in the rate. In the first set of proceedings, the tax authorities served a supplementary tax assessment on the applicant on 31 August 1987 on the ground that the property transferred to the company had been incorrectly valued. They requested payment of an aggregate sum of 43,624,700 Italian lire comprising the tax due and penalties. The applicant applied to the Oristano District Tax Commission for the supplementary tax assessment to be set aside. The case was struck out of the list in 1998.   In the other two sets of proceedings, the tax authorities served two supplementary tax assessments on the company on the ground that it was ineligible for the reduced rate of tax to which it had referred. The tax authorities’ note stated that the company would be liable to an administrative penalty of 20% of the amounts requested if payment was not made within sixty   days.   The two applications for the above-mentioned supplementary tax assessments to be set aside were still pending on appeal on 27 October 2000.   2.     Procedure and composition of the Court   The application was lodged on 26 February 1998.   Judgment was given by the Grand Chamber of seventeen judges, composed as follows:   Luzius Wildhaber (Swiss), President , Elisabeth Palm (Swedish), Christos Rozakis (Greek), Georg Ress (German), Jean-Paul Costa (French), Antonio Pastor Ridruejo (Spanish), Luigi Ferrari Bravo [1] (Italian), Giovanni Bonello (Maltese), Pranas Kūris (Lithuanian), Riza Türmen (Turkish), Viera Strážnická (Slovakian), Corneliu Bîrsan (Romanian), Peer Lorenzen (Danish), Marc Fischbach (Luxemburger), Hanne Sophie Greve (Norwegian), András Baka (Hungarian), Mindia Ugrekhelidze (Georgian), judges ,   and also Paul Mahoney , Registrar .   3.     Summary of the judgment [2]   Complaints   The applicant complained that the length of the proceedings had exceeded a “reasonable time” contrary to Article 6 § 1 of the European Convention on Human Rights. The applicant also complained that he had been “persecuted by the Italian courts” and relied on Article   14 of the Convention.   Decision of the Court   Article 6 § 1 of the Convention   Pecuniary interests were clearly at stake in tax proceedings, but merely showing that a dispute was “pecuniary” in nature was not in itself sufficient to attract the applicability of Article 6 §   1 under its “civil” head. There might exist “pecuniary” obligations vis-à-vis the State or its subordinate authorities which, for the purpose of Article 6 § 1, were to be considered as belonging exclusively to the realm of public law and were accordingly not covered by the notion of “civil rights and obligations”. Apart from fines imposed by way of “criminal sanction”, this would be the case, in particular, where an obligation which was pecuniary in nature derived from tax legislation or was otherwise part of normal civic duties in a democratic society.   It was incumbent on the Court to review whether, in the light of changed attitudes in society as to the legal protection that fell to be accorded to individuals in their relations with the State, the scope of Article 6 § 1 should not be extended to cover disputes between citizens and public authorities as to the lawfulness under domestic law of the tax authorities’ decisions.   Relations between the individual and the State had clearly developed in many spheres during the fifty years which had elapsed since the Convention had been adopted, with State regulation increasingly intervening in private-law relations. This had led the Court to find that procedures classified under national law as being part of “public law” could come within the purview of Article 6 under its “civil” head if the outcome was decisive for private rights and obligations. Moreover, the State’s increasing intervention in the individual’s day-to-day life, in terms of welfare protection for example, had required the Court to evaluate features of public law and private law before concluding that the asserted right could be classified as “civil”.   In the tax field, developments which might have occurred in democratic societies did not, however, affect the fundamental nature of the obligation on individuals or companies to pay tax. In comparison with the position when the Convention had been adopted, those developments had not entailed a further intervention by the State into the “civil” sphere of the individual’s life. The Court considered that tax matters still formed part of the hard core of public-authority prerogatives, with the public nature of the relationship between the taxpayer and the tax authority remaining predominant. It considered that tax disputes fell outside the scope of civil rights and obligations, despite the pecuniary effects which they necessarily produced for the taxpayer.   The principle according to which the autonomous concepts contained in the Convention had to be interpreted in the light of present-day conditions in democratic societies did not give the Court power to interpret Article   6 §   1 as though the adjective “civil” (with the restriction that that adjective necessarily placed on the category of “rights and obligations” to which that Article applied) were not present in the text.   Accordingly, Article 6 § 1 did not apply under its “civil” head to tax proceedings.   Article 14 of the Convention   Since the complaint had not been substantiated, it had to be dismissed as manifestly ill-founded.   Judges P. Lorenzen, C. Rozakis, G. Bonello, V. Strážnická, C. Bîrsan and M. Fischbach expressed a dissenting opinion, which is annexed to the judgment.   The Court’s judgments are accessible on its Internet site ( http://www.echr.coe.int ).   Registry of the European Court of Human Rights F – 67075 Strasbourg Cedex Contacts:   Roderick Liddell (telephone: (0)3 88 41 24 92)   Emma Hellyer (telephone: (0)3 90 21 42 15) Fax: (0)3 88 41 27 91   The European Court of Human Rights was set up in Strasbourg in 1959 to deal with alleged violations of the 1950 European Convention on Human Rights. On 1 November 1998 a full-time Court was established, replacing the original two-tier system of a part-time Commission and Court. [1] .     Judge elected in respect of San Marino. [2] .     This summary by the Registry does not bind the Court.