Taxpayer protection standard in international tax disputes

The research project aims to find the most optimal solution to develop the current level of taxpayers' guarantees in the tax treaty disputes resolution procedures.

The subject of the article is the analysis of the case law of the European Court of Human Rights on application and interpretation of Article 6 “Right to a fair trial” of the European Convention on Human Rights in the context of the tax treaty disputes resolution procedures.

The Author believes that the standard of protection of human right to a fair trial can be used as a starting point for the development of a taxpayer protection standard in the tax treaty disputes resolution procedures.

The methodology of the research includes the logical and analytical methods, such as analysis and synthesis, induction and deduction, as well as formal legal interpretation of the European Convention on Human Rights and the case law of the European Court of Human Rights.

The key findings are the following. Currently, the international tax disputes resolution procedures under tax treaties based on the OECD / UN Model Tax Conventions are contrary to Article 6 of the European Convention on Human Rights. The mutual agreement procedure, which provides the taxpayer with the opportunity personal participation, could eliminate such a contradiction.

The main results, scope of application. The study showed that two approaches in relation to application of the Article 6 of the European Convention on Human Rights to tax disputes can be defined – (a) formal and (b) “substantial”.

Formally, the guarantees of Article 6 of the European Convention on Human Rights do not apply to taxpayers in tax treaty disputes resolution procedures, i.e. mutual agreement procedure and arbitration, at least as long as a taxpayer has access to the national court of one of the contracting states to protect the violated rights. Under the case law of the European Court of Human Rights cross-border tax disputes are not typical category of disputes. At the moment the European Court of Human Rights does not express a position on the merits of such disputes with reference to the wide discretion of states in the field of taxation.

Nevertheless, according to the “substantial” approach it is necessary to extend guarantees of the right to a fair trial to taxpayers in the tax treaty disputes resolution procedures. This conclusion is based on the fact that the national courts cannot be treated as an effective means of protection of the rights of taxpayers as it is determined by the Article 13 of the European Convention on Human Rights. This approach is in line with the trend set by EU Directive 2017/1852 on tax dispute resolution mechanisms in the European Union, as well as the idea of foreign researchers to develop a global standard for protecting the rights of taxpayers.

In the Author’s view, compliance with the fair trial guarantees requires provision of direct participation of the taxpayers in the tax treaty disputes resolution procedures. In this case, the taxpayer will receive the opportunity to be heard and to review all the evidence and procedural documents on the case. The participation of the taxpayer will mitigate the key drawback of the mutual agreement procedure - the lack of a guarantee of a final decision on the case. This is especially important for those states that do not use arbitration, such as Russia.

The main conclusion is that the application of the standard of protection of human right to a fair trial in relation to the taxpayers in the tax treaty disputes resolution procedures is an efficient way to develop the current mutual agreement procedure and arbitration and to increase the confidence of taxpayers in these mechanisms.

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