Opinion of the Advocate General — ECLI:EU:C:2008:170
Date: 2008-03-13
Language of the case: Dutch
Based on: Treaty establishing the European Economic Community (1957)
Subject matter: Taxation;Free movement of capital
Procedure: Reference for a preliminary ruling
Origin: Netherlands

Summary of the Judgment Free movement of capital – Restrictions – Inheritance tax (EC Treaty, Arts 73b and 73d (now Arts 56 EC and 58 EC)) Articles 73b and 73d of the Treaty (subsequently, Articles 56 EC and 58 EC respectively) must be interpreted as precluding national rules concerning the assessment of inheritance duties and transfer duties payable in respect of an immovable property situated in a Member State, which, for the assessment of those duties, makes no provision for the deductibility of overendowment debts resulting from a testamentary parental partition inter vivos where the person whose estate is being administered was residing, at the time of death, not in that State but in another Member State, whereas provision is made for such deductibility where that person was residing, at the time of death, in the first-mentioned Member State, in which the immovable property included in the estate is situated, in so far as such rules apply a progressive rate of taxation and in so far as the combination of (i) the failure to take into account such debts and (ii) that progressive rate could result in a greater tax burden for heirs who are not in a position to rely on such deductibility. The restriction on the free movement of capital arises as a result of the fact that such national rules, applied in conjunction with a progressive rate of taxation, result in different treatment, on apportionment of the tax burden, between the various heirs of a person who, at the time of death, was residing in the Member State concerned and the heirs of a person who, at the time of death, was not. That difference in treatment cannot be justified on the ground that it concerns situations which are not objectively comparable. Where national legislation places the heirs of a person who, at the time of death, had the status of resident and those of a person who, at the time of death, had the status of non-resident on the same footing for the purposes of taxing an inherited immovable property which is situated in the Member State concerned, that legislation cannot, without giving rise to discrimination, treat those heirs differently in the taxation of that property so far as concerns the deductibility of charges secured on it. By treating the inheritances of those two categories of persons in the same way (except in relation to the deduction of debts) for the purposes of taxing their inheritance, the national legislature has in fact admitted that there is no objective difference between them in regard to the detailed rules and conditions relating to that taxation which could justify different treatment. That assessment is not affected by the fact that the rules of the Member State in which the person whose estate is being administered was residing at the time of death provide unilaterally for the possibility that a tax credit may be granted in respect of inheritance duties payable in another Member State on immovable property situated in that other State. The Member State in which the immovable property is situated cannot, in order to justify a restriction on the free movement of capital arising from its rules, rely on the existence of a possibility, beyond its control, of a tax credit being granted by another Member State – such as the Member State in which the person whose estate is being administered was residing at the time of death – which could, wholly or partly, offset the loss incurred by that person’s heirs as a result of the fact that, for the purposes of assessing transfer duties, no account is taken in the Member State in which that property is situated of overendowment debts resulting from a testamentary parental partition inter vivos. (see paras 46, 54, 57, 60, 65, 67, operative parts 1-2)