Woolworths Ltd v Commissioner of Taxation
[1999] FCA 102
At a glance
Source factsCourt
Federal Court of Australia
Decision date
1999-02-17
Before
Hely J
Source
Original judgment source is linked above.
Judgment (10 paragraphs)
REASONS FOR JUDGMENT 1 The applicant claims a declaration that the applicant is entitled to a sales tax credit under credit ground CR5 of Table 3 of Schedule 1 to the Sales Tax Assessment Act 1992 ("STAA") for the sales tax borne on 2,500 foil lined chicken bags ("the chicken bags") purchased by the applicant from C P Detmold Pty Ltd on 17 March 1998. 2 Table 3 of Schedule 1 to STAA sets out the situations in which a claimant is entitled to a credit with respect to sales tax (STAA, s 51(1)). Table 3 includes credit ground CR5. The operation of that ground is enlivened where: · The claimant is the taxpayer, · For an assessable dealing that is not taxable; and · The claimant has borne tax on the goods before the time of the assessable (current) dealing. 3 The applicant is a retailer of consumer goods including, amongst other goods, cooked chicken and cooked chicken pieces which are sold in the delicatessen sections of its stores. To prepare the applicant's cooked chicken, fresh chickens are placed in a rack in a steam convection oven and cooked according to a pre-set cycle. The cooked chickens are placed immediately into a glass-fronted food warmer until selected by a customer for purchase. Half and quarter portions of chickens are also sold in the applicant's delicatessen. Those portions are cut from the whole cooked chicken as required by the customer. The cooked chickens or chicken pieces, when selected by the customer, are placed in a foil lined chicken bag and handed to the customer by a delicatessen assistant. 4 The applicant buys the foil lined chicken bags from a manufacturer. The manufacturer includes in its invoice to the applicant an amount equal to sales tax payable in respect of the chicken bags and subsequently remits that amount to the Commissioner of Taxation. 5 The following propositions are uncontroversial: (a) When the Australian manufacturer sells the chicken bags to the applicant, there is an assessable dealing with respect to the chicken bags (STAA, s 16(1), Sch 1, Table 1, Item AD1a). An assessable dealing is not a taxable dealing if an exemption applies in terms of s 16(2) of STAA. The only relevant exemption in the instant circumstances is if the chicken bags are covered by an exemption Item in terms of s 24 of STAA which, by means of the definition of exemption Item in s 5 of STAA, means an item in Schedule I to the Sales Tax (Exemptions & Classifications) Act 1992 ("E & C Act"). The chicken bags were goods for use in the marketing or delivery of take away foodstuffs in terms of Schedule I to the E & C Act, Item 27(3); and therefore were not covered by that exemption item. As neither that exemption item nor any other is applicable, the sale of the chicken bags to the applicant is a taxable dealing. The applicant has borne tax on the chicken bags because it purchased the bags for a price that included tax (STAA s 11(3)). (b) When the applicant places a cooked chicken into the chicken bag, the chicken bag becomes a container for the cooked chicken (s 5, "container" (a)). That results in an application to own use ("AOU") of the chicken bags by the applicant (s 5, "application to own use" (e)) but the AOU does not give rise to an assessable dealing with respect to the chicken bags, because none of the items in Table 1 applies so as to produce that result. That has the further result that the chicken bags become Australian-used goods (s 5 "Australian used goods" paragraph (a)) and thus no longer assessable goods (s 5 "assessable goods"). (c) The applicant manufactured the chickens cooked by it in a supermarket as it applied a treatment to foodstuffs as a process in preparing them for human consumption ("STAA, s 5 "manufacture" (c)). The cooked chickens thus become Australian goods and assessable goods within the definitions of those terms in s 5 of STAA. (d) The applicant's retail sale of the cooked chickens gives rise to an assessable dealing with respect to the chickens under item AD2a of Table 1 of STAA. (e) The assessable dealing is not a taxable dealing because the cooked chickens are covered by an exemption item, being the retail sale of food for human consumption by the manufacturer (STAA s 24, E & C Act Schedule 1, Item 68(1)(a)). 6 The applicant has borne tax on the chicken bags. It did so at a time before the sale of the cooked chickens. If the chicken bags form part of the relevant assessable dealing then the applicant will be entitled to a credit in terms of CR 5. The issue, then, is whether the assessable dealing covers the chicken bags as well as the cooked chickens. An assessable dealing means any dealing covered by Table 1. The only Item in Table 1 that was suggested to be of application in the circumstances of the present case is Item AD2a: "retail sale by a person who manufactured the goods in the course of any business." Table 1 includes a Note (1) to the effect that Table 1 does not apply to a dealing with goods unless the goods are assessable goods immediately before the time of the dealing. Thus the retail sale will not be covered by Table 1 unless the goods the subject of the sale are assessable goods. 7 A consideration of the statutory provisions to which I have so far referred would, in my opinion, lead to the conclusion that there could not have been an assessable dealing by the applicant with respect to the chicken bag at the time of sale of a cooked chicken to a customer (even if, in a sale of goods sense, the chicken bag be regarded as part of the subject matter of the sale) because: · Table 1 is an exhaustive specification of what constitutes an assessable dealing. Note (1) (and see Diagram 1) indicates that only assessable goods can be the subject of an assessable dealing. It is common ground that the chicken bags ceased to be assessable goods on their AOU by the applicant. Their subsequent sale to a customer could not, therefore, give rise to an assessable dealing. · The relevant Item in Table 1 indicates that the seller should be the manufacturer of the goods the subject of the retail sale if the retail sale of those goods is to be an assessable dealing by virtue of that Item. The applicant is not the manufacturer of the chicken bags. 8 The only argument which counsel for the applicant put against the conclusion that the chicken bags were not part of an assessable dealing arising by virtue of a sale of a cooked chicken was that a conclusion to that effect would be inconsistent with the decision of the Court in CCA Beverages (Sydney) Pty Ltd v Federal Commissioner of Taxation (1995) 133 ALR 755; (1997) 143 ALR 212 (on appeal). 9 The entitlement to a credit for sales tax paid on the containers of soft drink was not directly in issue in that case (see 133 ALR at 776; 143 ALR at 216), and the Court was not required for the purpose of determining CCA's entitlement to the declaratory relief which it sought to determine whether CCA was entitled to a credit for sales tax paid on the container. Nonetheless, the Court considered CCA's entitlement to a credit, and came to the conclusion that the operation of CR4 was attracted so as to give rise to a credit entitlement. A declaration was made to the effect that CCA was entitled (as FCT contented) to a credit for the sales tax paid on the soft drink containers. The trial judge, at 133 ALR 755, 777 said: "... in my view the circumstances of the first sales fall within Item CR4 ("Avoiding double tax on the same goods"). The details of that ground are relevantly as follows: Claimant has become liable to tax on an assessable dealing ... but has borne tax on the goods before the time of [that] dealing ... It might be argued that the assessable dealing is in respect of the contents whereas the tax was borne on different goods, the containers. I do not think that the argument would prevail. Literally, contents and container are the subject of an assessable dealing or assessable dealings (AD1a and/or AD1b) found in the sale by CCA, and CCA bore tax on the first containers before the time of that sale." 10 At 133 ALR 755, 760-761 the trial judge noted a submission by CCA that Table 1 of the STAA Act did not apply to the sales, insofar as they were sales of the containers, because the containers ceased to be assessable goods when CCA applied them to its own use. It is implicit in the passage which I have quoted that the trial judge did not regard this submission as leading to the result that there could not have been an assessable dealing with respect to the containers because they ceased to be assessable goods prior to the point of retail sale. But why this is so does not emerge. See also 143 ALR 212 at 215, where it is accepted that the containers ceased to be assessable goods prior to the sale to the retailer. 11 On appeal, Lehane J, with whom the other members of Court agreed, said at 143 ALR 222: "In relation to the first relevant containers, Lindgren J held that a credit arose at the time of the first sales under credit ground CR4, "avoiding double tax on the same goods". There is a difficulty with that credit ground because its basis is that the claimant has become liable to tax on an assessable dealing but has borne tax on 'the goods' before the time of the current dealing. In this case, the relevant assessable dealing was with the contents and the goods on which tax had been paid were the containers. CCA, in support of its argument that s 95 should be held and apply, to avoid double taxation, suggested that CR4 was inapplicable because the dealing was not with the goods on which tax had been paid. I see no reason, however, to dissent from his Honour's conclusion that: 'Literally, contents and container are the subject of an assessable dealing or assessable dealings ... and CCA bore tax on the first containers before the time of that sale.' The Commissioner did not seek to disturb that conclusion." 12 The observations which I have quoted, if applied to CR5 would stand in the way of the construction of CR5 for which the respondent here contends, and which I would otherwise accept. It was not submitted that there is any material distinction between CR4 and CR5 so far as the application of these observations is concerned. 13 The applicant submits that I am bound to find that the assessable dealing covers the chicken bags as well as the cooked chickens because CCA so decides. The respondent submits that the observations which I have quoted are obiter, uncritical in character, unsupported by any reasoning process and that they cannot be correct. 14 Professor Cross described the ratio decidendi as: "Any rule of law expressly or implicitly treated by the judge as a necessary step in reaching his conclusion having regard to the line of reasoning adopted by him ..."; R Cross and J W Harris: Precedent in English Law (4th Edn) p 72. 15 Sir Anthony Mason, when writing extra-judicially, said: "The ratio is the principle or statement of law on which the previous decision is based to the extent to which it is essential to the decision."; The Use and Abuse of Precedent (1988) Australian Bar Review 93 at p 103. 16 The trial judge expressly stated (at 133 ALR 776) that he was not required to determine whether CCA was entitled to a credit for the purpose of deciding its entitlement to the relief sought. Nor did the full Court treat it as "necessary" to determine whether there was a credit entitlement in order to determine the appeal. The observations earlier quoted were amongst a number of reasons why CCA's arguments based on s 95 of STAA failed. The Commissioner did not seek to disturb the trial judge's conclusion that there was an entitlement to a credit under CR4, and, in any event, the sale of the containers to CCA was subject to an exemption by virtue of Item 27 of Schedule I to the E & C Act. 17 That being so, I do not believe that I am bound to reach a result in the present case which accords with the declaration as to the entitlement to a credit made in CCA. Nor is there any reasoning process to be found in the judgments which, if applied to CR5, would require a conclusion that goods which have ceased to be assessable goods are nonetheless covered by Table 1, when the effect of Note (1) is that Table 1 does not apply to a dealing with them. The applicant offered no answer to the respondent's submissions in this respect apart from invoking the actual decision in CCA, and referring to the passages which I have quoted. No submission was put, nor do I think that it is the case, that a dealing is nonetheless "covered by" Table 1, notwithstanding that Note (1) to the Table renders Table 1 inapplicable to that dealing. 18 In those circumstances I think that I should give effect to my own views as to the proper construction and application of the legislation, as set forth in paragraph 7 above. That construction is consistent with the statutory scheme in as much as containers for take away goods are excepted from the general principle that containers are taxed at the same time as their contents are taxed, and at the rate, if any, applicable to their contents. 19 I therefore dismiss the claim insofar as it seeks a declaration to the effect of that set forth at the commencement of these reasons.