VAT zero-rating for listed buildings does not extend to curtilage outbuildings unless the altered structure itself is a protected building.

VAT zero-rating for works to a protected building applied only where the building actually altered itself satisfied the statutory definition, including the dwelling requirement. Works carried out to an outbuilding within the curtilage of a listed house did not qualify merely because planning law treated that structure as part of the listed building for control purposes. The VAT provisions were construed by their own wording and structure, and the curtilage fiction did not extend to treating separate works on the outbuilding as an approved alteration of the protected building. The disputed works were therefore outside item 2 of Group 6 in Schedule 8 to the Value Added Tax Act 1994.

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Issues: Whether works carried out to an outbuilding within the curtilage of a listed house constituted an approved alteration of a protected building so as to qualify for zero-rating under Group 6 of Schedule 8 to the Value Added Tax Act 1994.

Analysis: The zero-rating provisions in item 2 of Group 6 apply only where the services are supplied in the course of an approved alteration of a protected building. A protected building must satisfy both elements of the definition in note (1): it must be a building designed to remain as or become a dwelling or number of dwellings, and it must also be a listed building within the meaning of the Planning (Listed Buildings and Conservation Areas) Act 1990. The actual building altered here was the outbuilding, not the main house. Although section 1(5) of the 1990 Act treated the outbuilding as part of the listed building for planning-control purposes, that statutory fiction did not displace the ordinary meaning of the word "building" in the VAT legislation. The language and structure of the VAT provisions show that the building being altered itself must satisfy the dwelling requirement. Note (10) did not justify treating construction or conversion of a separate building within the curtilage as an alteration of the protected building. The legislative purpose also pointed to a restricted residential zero-rating and not to all works affecting buildings within the curtilage of listed property.

Conclusion: The outbuilding was not a protected building for the purposes of item 2, and the works did not qualify for zero-rating.

Final Conclusion: The appeal succeeded and the commissioners' assessment stood, with the taxpayers not entitled to zero-rating for the disputed works.

Ratio Decidendi: For VAT zero-rating under item 2 of Group 6 in Schedule 8 to the Value Added Tax Act 1994, the building actually altered must itself satisfy the definition of a protected building; a planning fiction treating a curtilage structure as part of a listed building does not, by itself, make that separate structure a dwelling-building for VAT purposes.

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