Judgment_paragraph 16 · Staatssecretaris van Financiën v Coffeeshop "Siberië" vof (C-158/98)

16The Netherlands Government and the Commission maintain that VAT must be charged on the activity in question. A distinction must be made between supplying drugs and actions ancillary thereto. Renting out the table is an act which is not prohibited as such; there is a lawful market in that regard, which is in competition with the unlawful market. Consequently, such a supply is subject to VAT, as the Court held with regard to the unauthorised export of computer systems (Case C-111/92 Lange ν Finanzamt Fürstenfeldbruck [1993] ECR I-4677), counterfeit perfumes (Case C-3/97 Goodwin and Unstead [1998] ECR I-3257) and the organisation of illegal gaming (Case C-283/95 Fischer ν Finanzamt Donaueschingen [1998] ECR I-3369), on the ground that they were not goods or services outside normal economic channels or in a situation where all competition between a lawful economic sector and an unlawful sector was precluded.

Staatssecretaris van Financiën v Coffeeshop "Siberië" vof (C-158/98)

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