Academic Scientific JournalsRegulatory impact assessments (Ria) As an input in tax law interpretation: Analysis of the administrative courts verdicts
Keywords:
purpose-oriented interpretation of tax law, lawmaker’s intent, regulatory impact assessmentsAbstract
The goal of this paper is to empirically examine the role of Regulatory Impact Assessments (RIAs) accompanying draft laws submitted by the Council of the Ministers as an input in purpose-oriented interpretation of tax law, carried out by Polish Administrative Courts. To this end, full-text database of the universe of Administrative Courts verdicts (CBOIS) had been queried in order to uncover all court decisions issued from Jan 1st 2001 to Dec 31st 2022 and mentioning RIAs in their written motives. All in all 14 decisions of SAC and 39 decisions of FIACs had been located – the result that can be interpreted as an evidence of scant use of RIA as an input for statutory interpretation of the tax law. Qualitative analysis reported in the paper illustrates what sort of information had been recovered by justices from RIA. Results suggest that potential offered by RIA’s coverage of ‘lawmaker’s intent’ is still not fully utilized in the process of tax law interpretation. However, any reliance on this sort of documents have to be accompanied with critical analysis of their quality and role in lawmaking process. Conditional forecasts (what impact is reasonably expected) should not be mistaken with statements of the intent (what impact is desired). Moreover, perfunctory RIA, prepared as part of window-dressing exercise, not genuine analysis underpinning the decision-making process, could turned out misleading.
Downloads
References
Bielska-Brodziak, A.: Śladami prawodawcy faktycznego [In the footsteps of the actual lawmaker], Warszawa: Wolters Kluwer, 2017.
Cserne, P.: Formalism in judicial reasoning: Is Central and Eastern Europe a special case? (in:) M. Bobek (ed.), Central European Judges under the European Influence: The Transformative Power of the EU Revisited (23–42). Oxford: Hart Publishing, 2015. DOI: 10.5040/9781782257882.ch-002.
Gajewski, D., Werner, A., Karwat, P., Olczyk, A., Wierzbicki, J.: Tax Policy Trends in Central and Eastern European Countries and Their Influence on Enterprises’ Tax Obligations (in:) M. Strojny (ed.) Raport SGH i Forum Ekonomicznego 2020, Warszawa: Oficyna Wydawnicza SGH [SGH Publishing House], 2020.
Gajewski, D., Joński, K.: Ocena skutków regulacji (OSR) jako źródło ustalania celu prawodawczego w wykładni prawa podatkowego [Regulatory Impact Assessment (RIA) as a source for establishing legislative purpose in the interpretation of tax law ] (in:) Gajewski D. (ed.) Funkcjonowanie sądownictwa administracyjnego na tle zmian koniunktury gospodarczej: perspektywa Ekonomicznej Analizy Prawa [The functioning of the administrative judiciary against the backdrop of economic developments: an Economic Law Analysis perspective], Warszawa: Oficyna Wydawnicza SGH [SGH Publishing House], 2022.
Goetz, K., Zubek, R.: Stanowienie Prawa w Polsce. Reguły Legislacyjne a jakość ustawodawstwa [Lawmaking in Poland. Legislative Rules and the Quality of Legislation], Sprawne Państwo - Program Ernst & Young [The Efficient State - Ernst & Young Programme]: Warszawa, 2005. Available at: https://www.inpris.pl/fileadmin/user_upload/documents/Biblioteka_PL/Stanowien ie_Prawa_w_Polsce._Regu%C5%82y_Legislacyjne_a_jako%C5%9B%C4%87_ustawo dawstwa.pdf, accessed: January 13th, 2023.
Jankowski J., Klimiuk, W.: Podatek od nieruchomości komercyjnych – podatek dochodowy czy majątkowy? [Commercial property tax - income or wealth tax?], Kwartalnik Prawa Podatkowego No. 3, 2018. DOI: 10.18778/1509-877X.2018.03.05.
Joński K., Rogowski W.: Legislative inflation in Poland: bird’s eye view on three decades after the the 1989 breakthrough, The Journal of Legislative Studies, 2022. DOI: 10.1080/13572334.2022.2052465.
Kopińska G., Makowski, G., Waglowski, P., Wiszowaty, M.: Tworzenie i konsultowanie rządowych projektów ustaw [Drafting and consulting on government bills], 2014. Available at: https://www.batory.org.pl/upload/files/Programy%20operacyjne/Odpowiedzialne %20Panstwo/Tworzenie_i_konsultowanie.pdf, accessed: January 13th, 2023.
Kurczewski, J.: Power and wisdom: The expert as mediating figure in contemporary Polish history, (in:) Maclean I., Montefiore A., Winch P. (eds.), The Political Responsibility of Intellectuals, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1990.
Leszczyński, L.: Wykładnia celowościowo-funkcjonalna przepisów prawa administracyjnego [Purposive-functional interpretation of administrative law provisions] (in:) Leszczyński, L.: Zirk-Sadowski, M., Wojciechowski, B. (eds.) Wykładnia w prawie administracyjnym, System Prawa Administracyjnego [Interpretation in administrative law, System of Administrative Law], Warszawa: C.H. Beck, 2015.
Matczak, M., Bencze, M., Kühn, Z.: Constitutions, EU Law and Judicial Strategies in the Czech Republic, Hungary and Poland, Journal of Public Policy, 30(1), 2010. Available at: http://www.jstor.org/stable/40783569, accessed: January 13th, 2023.
Matczak, M., Bencze, M., Kühn, Z.: EU Law and Central European Judges: Administrative Judiciaries in the Czech Republic, Hungary and Poland Ten Years after Accession, (in:) Bobek, M. (ed.), Central European Judges under the European Influence: The Transformative Power of the EU Revisited, Oxford: Hart Publishing, 2010. DOI: 10.5040/9781782257882.ch-003.
Posner, R. A.: Pragmatic Adjudication, 18 Cardozo Law Review 1, 1996. Schauer, F.: Formalism: Legal, Constitutional, Judicial (in:) K. Whittington, R. Kelemen, G. Caldeira, The Oxford Handbook of Law and Politics, Oxford University Press, New York, 2010.
Schauer, F.: Formalism (in:) May, L., Brown, J. (eds.), Philosophy of law: classic and contemporary readings, Wiley-Blackwell: Chichester, 2010.
Tobor, Z.: W poszukiwaniu intencji prawodawcy, Warszawa: Wolters Kluwer Polska, 2013.
Zirk-Sadowski, M., Golecki, M., Wojciechowski, B.: Multicentrism as an Emerging Paradigm in Legal Theory, Peter Lang, Frankfurt am Main, 2009.
Legal Acts
Resolution No. 125 of the Council of Ministers of September 4, 2001 amending the resolution - the Rules of Procedure of the Council of Ministers (Journal „Polish Monitor” 2001 No. 33, item 547).
Resolution No. 190 of the Council of Ministers of 29 October 2013.
Rules of Procedure of the Council of Ministers (Journal of Laws 2013, item 979).
Court rulings
SAC [Naczelny Sąd Administracyjny w Polsce, Supreme Administrative Court of Poland] judgement of 22nd January, 2014, II FSK 2384/11.
SAC judgement of 5th February, 2019, I FSK 426/17.
SAC judgement of 3rd March, 2021, I FSK 830/20.
FIAC [Wojewódzki Sąd Administracyjny, Provincional Administrative Court of First Instance Administrative Court] judgement of 27th May, 2011, I SA/Lu 89/11.
FIAC judgement of 16th June, 2011, I SA/Sz 246/11. FIAC judgement of 13th July, 2011, I SA/Lu 147/11.
FIAC judgement of 13th July, 2011, I SA/Lu 148/11. FIAC judgement of 27th July, 2015, I SA/Kr 902/15.
FIAC judgement of 14th December, 2016, III SA/Gl 672/16.
FIAC judgement of 25th January, 2017, III SA/Gl 745/16.
FIAC judgement of 23rd February, 2017, III SA/Gl 1466/16. FIAC judgement of 23rd March, 2017, III SA/Gl 1589/16.
FIAC judgement of 1st December, 2017, I SA/Gl 970/17. FIAC judgement of 17th May, 2019, I SA/Wr 86/19.
FIAC judgement of 14th February, 2020, III SA/Wa 1038/19.
FIAC judgement of 12th January, 2022, III SA/Wa 998/21. FIAC judgement of 4th February, 2020, I SA/Gl 1533/19.
Other official documents
OECD, Regulatory Impact Analysis. Best Practices in OECD Countries, OECD, Paris, 1997.
OECD, Regulatory Policy Outlook 2015. Country Profile Poland, OECD, Paris, 2015. Internet resources Better Regulations Program, available at: https://www.inpris.pl/fileadmin/user_upload/documents/Biblioteka_PL/Program_Lepsze_Regulacje_2015_01.pdf, accessed: January 13th, 2023.
Downloads
Published
How to Cite
Issue
Section
License
Financial Law Review is an open access journal which means that all the articles published are freely available without charge to the reader or his/her institution.
The articles published in Financial Law Review are available under a licence Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0)
The Author furnishes a non-exclusive and free-of-charge license to use the his Work without territorial limitations and for an unlimited period.
Archiving policy
All texts from the journal Financial Law Review are published in electronic version. We strive to archive texts in various databases. Archival issues are also available on the platform of the Academic Scientific Journals: https://czasopisma.bg.ug.edu.pl/index.php/flr/index
Moreover articles published in the journal are archived at the Repository of the University of Gdansk.
