The Landfill Tax (Qualifying Fines) (No. 2) Order 2015

Statutory Instruments

2015 No. 1385

Landfill Tax, England And Wales

Landfill Tax, Northern Ireland

The Landfill Tax (Qualifying Fines) (No. 2) Order 2015

Made

12th June 2015

Laid before the House of Commons

12th June 2015

Coming into force

15th June 2015

The Treasury, in exercise of the powers conferred by sections 42(3A) and (3B) and 63A(2) to (5) of the Finance Act 1996 M1 , make the following Order:

Marginal Citations

M1 1996 c.8; sections 42(3A), 42(3B) and 63A were inserted into the Finance Act 1996 by section 65 of, and paragraphs 2 and 4 of Schedule 15 to, the Finance Act 2015 (c. 11). Under paragraph 8 of Schedule 15 to the Finance Act 2015, these amendments to the Finance Act 1996 have effect in relation to disposals that are made in England and Wales or Northern Ireland and made (or treated as made) on or after 1st April 2015.

Citation and commencement U.K.

1.  This Order may be cited as the Landfill Tax (Qualifying Fines) (No. 2) Order 2015 M2 and comes into force on 15th June 2015.

Marginal Citations

M2 This Order replaces S.I. 2015/845 which ceased to have effect on 14th June 2015 pursuant to section 71(4) of the Finance Act 1996.

Interpretation U.K.

2.  In this Order—

[F1 “hazardous waste” means anything that—

(a)

is hazardous waste for the purposes of the Waste Directive, and

(b)

is not excluded from the scope of the Waste Directive by Article 2 of that Directive;]

“LOI percentage” means the amount of non-qualifying material contained in fines M3 , as indicated by the percentage of the mass of those fines lost on ignition;

“LOI test” means a test to determine the LOI percentage of fines, conducted in accordance with the terms of a published notice;

“published notice” refers to a notice issued by the Commissioners M4 and not revoked by a further notice;

“qualifying material” means the materials and descriptions listed in columns 1 and 2, subject to the conditions expressed in column 3, of the Schedule to the Landfill Tax (Qualifying Material) Order 2011 M5 ;

“non-qualifying material” means any material other than qualifying material;

“transfer note” means written information or a transfer note within the meaning of—

(a)

the Waste (England and Wales) Regulations 2011 M6 , where the transferor of material to a landfill site is a person in England and Wales;

(b)

the Controlled Waste (Duty of Care) Regulations (Northern Ireland) 2002 M7 , where the transferor of material to a landfill site is a person in Northern Ireland;

(c)

the Environmental Protection (Duty of Care) (Scotland) Regulations 2014 M8 , where the transferor of material to a landfill site is a person in Scotland.

[F2 “the Waste Directive” means Directive 2008/98/EC of the European Parliament and Council as modified by section 37(3) to (9) of the Waste and Emissions Trading Act 2003.]

Textual Amendments

F1 Words in art. 2 substituted (31.12.2020) by The Taxes (Amendments) (EU Exit) Regulations 2019 (S.I. 2019/689), regs. 1, 35(2)(a) (with regs. 39-41); 2020 c. 1, Sch. 5 para. 1(1)

F2 Words in art. 2 inserted (31.12.2020) by The Taxes (Amendments) (EU Exit) Regulations 2019 (S.I. 2019/689), regs. 1, 35(2)(b) (with regs. 39-41); 2020 c. 1, Sch. 5 para. 1(1)

Marginal Citations

M3 Section 70(1) of the Finance Act 1996 defines “fines” as particles produced by a waste treatment process that involves an element of mechanical treatment.

M4 Section 70(1) of the Finance Act 1996 defines “the Commissioners” as those of Customs and Excise for the purposes of Part 3 of that Act. The functions of the Commissioners of Customs and Excise were transferred to the Commissioners for Her Majesty's Revenue and Customs by section 5(1) of the Commissioners for Revenue and Customs Act 2005 (c. 11). Section 50(1) of the latter Act provides that a reference to the Commissioners of Customs and Excise shall be taken as a reference to the Commissioners for Her Majesty's Revenue and Customs.

M5 S.I. 2011/1017, amended by S.I. 2012/940.

M6 S.I. 2011/988, amended by S.I. 2014/656; there are other amending instruments, but none is relevant.

M7 S.R. (NI) 2002 No. 271, amended by S.R. (NI) 2004 No. 277 and S.R. (NI) 2013 No. 255.

M8 S.S.I. 2014/4.

Qualifying fines U.K.

3.—(1) Subject to paragraphs (2) and (3), and to article 4, any qualifying material is prescribed for the purposes of section 42(3A)(a) of the Finance Act 1996.

(2) The mixture mentioned in that section must—

(a) contain no more than an incidental amount of non-qualifying material; and

(b) not be hazardous waste.

(3) That mixture must not result from any deliberate or artificial blending or mixing with any quantity of material (including fines), prior to disposal at a landfill site.

Conditions applicable to qualifying fines U.K.

4.—(1) The fines contained in any quantity of material received by a registrable person M9 for disposal must not be treated as qualifying fines unless all of the following conditions are met—

(a) where the owner of the fines immediately prior to the disposal and the registrable person are not the same person, the registrable person holds a transfer note in respect of that quantity of material;

(b) the registrable person holds such evidence as is specified in a published notice that the fines are qualifying fines;

(c) where a LOI test has been conducted on any part of the fines in accordance with any published notice, the LOI percentage determined by that test does not exceed—

(i) if the fines tested were disposed of or treated as disposed of prior to 1st April 2016, 15%; or

(ii) if the fines tested were disposed of or treated as disposed of on or after 1st April 2016, 10%; and

(d) where the Commissioners have directed a registrable person to conduct a LOI test of a quantity of material proposed to be disposed of as qualifying fines, that person conducts the test.

(2) No material received by a registrable person for disposal as fines shall be treated as qualifying fines, for the period specified in paragraph (3), unless the registrable person has conducted the LOI test in accordance with such requirements in relation to the test as may be specified by published notice.

(3) For the purpose of paragraph (2), the period begins on the date that the condition in that paragraph is not met and ends when that condition is met.

Marginal Citations

M9 Section 47(10) of the Finance Act 1996 defines a registrable person as a person who is, or is liable to be, registered under that section.

George Hollingbery

Mel Stride

Two of the Lords Commissioners of Her Majesty's Treasury

Explanatory Note

(This note is not part of the Order)

This Order sets out the requirements of qualifying fines, and conditions that fines must satisfy in order to be treated as qualifying fines pursuant to sections 42(3A) and 63A(2) of the Finance Act 1996 (‘the Act’).

If fines are qualifying fines, they will be subject to landfill tax at the lower rate, set out in section 42(2) of the Act.

Article 3 specifies that, to be qualifying fines, fines must comprise qualifying material under the Landfill Tax (Qualifying Material) Order 2011 (S.I. 2011/1017). Such material may only be mixed with an incidental amount of other material, must not be blended or mixed prior to, or following, its processing into fines, and it must not be hazardous waste.

Article 4 sets out evidential conditions which, if breached, may cause fines not to be treated as qualifying fines, and therefore be liable to the standard rate of the tax under section 42(1) of the Act.

A Tax Information and Impact Note covering this instrument was published on 10th December 2014 and is available on the gov.uk website at https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/tax-information-and-impact-notes-tiins. It remains an accurate summary of the impacts that apply to this instrument.