{"id":46518,"date":"2020-10-03T17:10:02","date_gmt":"2020-10-03T21:10:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sidebarforplaintiffs.naomifein.net\/?p=46518"},"modified":"2020-10-03T17:10:02","modified_gmt":"2020-10-03T21:10:02","slug":"youve-heard-about-the-not-bread-judicial-decision-right","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sidebarforplaintiffs.naomifein.net\/?p=46518","title":{"rendered":"You’ve heard about the not-bread judicial decision, right?"},"content":{"rendered":"

I’ve read about this in a couple of other sources but for such a crucial judicial decision, I go immediately to my insider, Kevin Underhill, Esq., maestro of Lowering the Bar.<\/a><\/p>\n

If you read the entire thing, which you should and it isn’t even long, you’ll see a bit of breaking news. Which will bring you back to surreality, where we’ve all been living for almost four years.<\/p>\n

Warning: don’t read this when you’re hungry.<\/p>\n

Court Rules Bread Does Not Meet Definition of Bread<\/h2>\n

Oct 01, 2020 11:03 pm | Kevin<\/h4>\n

\"sandwich\"<\/p>\n

It seems like only yesterday, but was in fact November 17, 2006, when I reported that Judge Jeffrey Locke had determined that a burrito is not a sandwich<\/a>. I thought the result in that case was correct even though it wasn\u2019t entirely clear what legal test the court had applied, and that possibly the judge was unduly impressed with the parade of culinary experts who apparently testified on this important issue. That case only involved a lease at a shopping mall, though. This one could spark an international incident.<\/em><\/p>\n

Well, it\u2019s not impossible that it might, if there were somebody who had an incentive to start a war over something stupid in the next 30 days or so. Luckily I can\u2019t think of anyone like that.<\/em><\/p>\n

On Tuesday, Ireland\u2019s Supreme Court held that the bread in Subway sandwiches is not \u201cbread\u201d<\/a> for purposes of the country\u2019s Value Added Tax Act of 1972. Under that law, passed at a time when Ireland was desperately short of hyphens, bread taxation depends on whether the bread meets certain criteria necessary to make it a \u201cstaple food.\u201d Among other things, the the weight of sugar in the bread must not exceed two percent of the weight of flour. If the bread meets all the criteria, then it is a \u201cstaple food\u201d and therefore tax-free. If not, then it would be in the category of \u201call other confectionery and bakery products whether cooked or uncooked,\u201d and therefore subject to a 13.5% VAT.<\/em><\/p>\n

Turns out that the bread in a Subway sandwich \u201chas a sugar content of 10%<\/strong> of the weight of the flour included in the dough\u201d (emphasis added), five times the applicable limit. Which \u2026 kind of seems like a lot?<\/em><\/p>\n

The analysis is actually more complicated than the above suggests, and the opinion has a lot to say about principles of statutory interpretation. For example, the court says that\u2014<\/em><\/p>\n

Excuse me, I\u2019ve just been handed a bulletin.<\/em><\/p>\n

According to this, Donald Trump has tested positive for the coronavirus.<\/em><\/p>\n

I apologize, but all resources previously committed to discussing the nature of statutory interpretation under Irish law, or other questions raised by the opinion, such as the proper classification of hot meatball sandwiches that do meet the criteria above, are now being diverted on an emergency basis to more critical tasks such as the creation and deployment of tweets.<\/em><\/p>\n

In the interim, you may wish to review some of my previous sandwich-related coverage, such as a libel suit against a food critic who made fun of a restaurant\u2019s strip steak<\/a>; a lawsuit against Blimpie\u2019s claiming that their \u201cSuper Stacked\u201d sandwiches<\/a> did not actually contain \u201ctwice the meat\u201d of their competitors\u2019 offering; a carnival worker\u2019s claim that his chicken sandwich exploded<\/a> when he bit into it; and the Seventh Circuit\u2019s ruling that plaintiffs\u2019 lawyers should not get $525,000 in fees for achieving an \u201cutterly worthless\u201d settlement in a case alleging that Subway\u2019s \u201cfootlong\u201d sandwiches were not, in fact, exactly one foot long<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I’ve read about this in a couple of other sources but for such a crucial judicial decision, I go immediately to my insider, Kevin Underhill, Esq., maestro of Lowering the Bar. If you read the entire thing, which you should … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5369,5929,337,4789,1095,1175,2902],"tags":[6299,6297,5327,6298,6300,1579,699,5598,6301],"class_list":["post-46518","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-covid-19","category-american-fascism","category-legal-news","category-political-campaigns","category-politics","category-the-facts-of-life","category-trump-stuff","tag-blimpies","tag-bread","tag-covid-19","tag-irish-judicial-bread-decision","tag-irish-law","tag-kevin-underhill","tag-lowering-the-bar","tag-subway","tag-value-added-tax"],"aioseo_notices":[],"aioseo_head":"\n\t\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\t