GANTZNER - France (Nº 43604/98)
Decision 5.10.99 [Section III]

The applicant was the subject of supplementary income tax assessments under which he was required to pay additional income tax, together with a 50% surcharge for acting in bad faith imposed under a provision of the old General Tax Code. His appeals against the supplementary assessments were unsuccessful.

Inadmissible under Article 6(1): It was the settled case-law of the Convention institutions that the limb of Article 6(1) covering "civil rights and obligations" did not apply to tax disputes, even where the fiscal measures in question had repercussions on pecuniary rights. In the instant case, the tax surcharge had been imposed on the applicant as a penalty for bad faith, and if that penalty had been the subject matter of the domestic proceedings, Article 6(1) could have applied. However, the applicant had focused his arguments in the administrative courts exclusively on the level of additional tax he had been required to pay. The impugned proceedings had not, therefore, dealt with the penalty imposed: incompatible ratione materiae.