‘Supplies of theatre and museum tickets fall within the ‘cultural exemption’ under Schedule 9 of the VAT Act 1994. However, the business model of many cultural venues does not rely solely on income from ticket sales. As well as funds from public grants and endowments, many venues also make taxable supplies of food and drink at on-site bars and restaurants, or sell other merchandise too. On the input side, venues will have paid VAT on the costs of staging productions or putting on exhibitions. The present appeal concerned whether the Royal Opera House’s production costs fell to be attributed solely to its exempt sales of tickets and taxable sales of programmes, or alternatively to a wider range of taxable supplies, principally its bar and restaurant offerings.’
Monckton Chambers, June 2020
Source: www.monckton.com
