K Oy

European Union – Value added tax. The Court of Justice of the European Union made a preliminary ruling on the interpretation of the first subpara of art 98(2) of, and point 6 of Annex III to, Council Directive (EC) 2006/112, as amended. The request had been made in proceedings between a publishing company and the Finnish tax board, and the issue was whether the Directive had to be interpreted as precluding national legislation, such as that at issue in the main proceedings, under which books published in paper form were subject to a reduced rate of VAT and books published on other physical supports, such as CDs, CD-ROMs or USB keys, were subject to the standard rate of VAT.