‘According to settled case law …, the taxable amount for the supply of goods or services for consideration is the consideration actually received for them by the taxable person. That consideration is thus the subjective value, that is to say, the value actually received, and not a value estimated according to objective criteria.’
“The basis for the proposition, which was accepted by both sides, that statutory authority to charge is required is the well known principle exemplified by the ratio decidendi of Attorney-General v Wilts United Dairies Ltd ( 1921 ) 37 TLR 885 (Court of Appeal)(1922) 38 TLR 781 (House of Lords): ‘In these circumstances, if an officer of the executive seeks to justify a charge upon the subject made for the use of the Crown (which includes all the purposes of the public revenue), he must show, in clear terms, that Parliament has authorised the particular charge. The intention of the legislature is to be inferred from the language used, and the grant of powers may, though not expressed, have to be implied as necessarily arising from the words of a statute; but in view of the historic struggle of the legislature to secure for itself the sole power to levy money upon the subject, its complete success in that struggle, the elaborate means adopted by the Representative House to control the amount, the conditions and the purposes of the levy, the circumstances would be remarkable indeed which would induce the court to believe that the legislature had sacrificed all the well known checks and precautions, and, not in express words, but merely by implication, had entrusted a minister of the Crown with undefined and unlimited powers of imposing charges upon the subject for purposes connected with his department:’ per Atkin LJ 37 TLR 884 , 886. Atkin LJ further observed, at p. 887: “It makes no difference that the obligation to pay the money is expressed in the form of an agreement. It was illegal for the Food Controller to require such an agreement as a condition of any licence. It was illegal for him to enter into such an agreement. The agreement itself is not enforceable against the other contracting party; and if he had paid under it he could, having paid under protest, recover back the sums paid, as money had and received to his use.’ I refer also to the observation of Scrutton L.J., at p. 885: ‘It is conceivable that Parliament, which may pass legislation requiring the subject to pay money to the Crown, may also delegate its powers of imposing such payments to the executive, but in my view the clearest words should be required before the courts hold that such an unusual delegation has taken place. As Wilde C.J. said in Gosling v. Veley ( 1850 ) 12 QB 328 , 407: ‘The rule of law that no pecuniary burden can be imposed upon the subjects of this country, by whatever name it may be called, whether tax, due, rate or toll, except under clear and distinct legal authority, established by those who seek to impose the burden, has been so often the subject of legal decision that it may be deemed a legal axiom, and requires no authority to be cited in support of it.’”
“The rule is that a charge cannot be made unless the power to charge is given by express words or by necessary implication . These last words impose a rigorous test going far beyond the proposition that it would be reasonable or even conducive or incidental to charge for the provision of a service. Furthermore, as it seems to me, the relevance of the contrast attempted to be drawn, with respect to the power of a council to charge, between duty functions and discretionary functions is vitiated when one has regard to the large number of discretionary functions for the provision of which express statutory authority to charge has been enacted. I am not impressed by the submission that an express power to charge for the performance of discretionary functions may have been conferred “for the sake of clarity.” 9. The statutory provisions enabling the Council to charge for the provision of car parking services are contained in theRoad Traffic Regulations Act 1984 (“RTRA”), the Local Authority Traffic Orders (Procedure) (England and Wales Regulations 1996 (“Parking Regulations”) and theBorough Council of King’s Lynn and West Norfolk (Off-street Parking Places) (No 2) Order 2015 (as amended by theBorough Council of King’s Lynn and West Norfolk (Off-Street Parking Places) Amendment Order 2018 ) (the “Parking Order”) which replacedThe Borough Council of King’s Lynn and West Norfolk (Off-street Parking Places) Consolidation and Variation Order 2011 that was considered by the FTT in King’s Lynn No 1 . 10. Unders 35 RTRA a local authority may, by order, make provision for parking and “the charges to be paid in connection with its use where it is an off-street one)”