The people*s rights of property as protected by Article 15 of the Constitution are involved when the State imposes monetary obligations other than taxation on certain people based on specific purposes of the public interest. The purpose, target and range of the obligation should be either provided by law or through an order made by the authority in charge within the scope explicitly authorized by law. With regard to the monetary payment obligation, it should be based on a just legislative purpose and be collected within a necessary scope from the proper target in a reasonable manner and range in order to be consistent with the principle of equality and the principle of proportionality.
Where the State imposes monetary payment obligation on certain people, it should clearly prescribe the purpose, target and range of the collection by law. If the law explicitly authorizes the authority in charge to make necessary rules by orders, such rules should be comprehensively judged from the viewpoint of their relevancy as expressed by the enabling statute in its entirety, whether the authorization granted by the legislative authority satisfies the principle of express delegation and whether the order made by the executive authority in charge breaches or conflicts with the authorization of the enabling statute. Article 27-I of the Highway Act as amended and promulgated on January 23, 1984, provides that “The authority in charge of highways, for the purposes of raising the funds for maintenance, repair and safety management of highways, may collect the automobile fuel use fees, the rate of which shall be higher than fifty percent (50%) of the price of importing the fuel or the ex factory price.” Paragraph II of the same Article authorizes the Ministry of Transportation and Communications, after consulting with the Ministry of Finance, to make the Regulations Governing the Collection and Distribution of Automobile Fuel Use Fees. Article 75 of the said Act provides that if the owner of the automobile does not pay the automobile fuel use fees as required by law, the authority in charge of highways shall notify the owner that he or she should pay within a specified period of time. Therefore, the Highway Act has explicitly authorized the purpose, target and ceiling of the range of collection of the automobile fuel use fees and authorized the authority in charge to decide the manners of collection and distribution after the collection. The purpose, scope and the material contents have been clearly prescribed so the authorization is consistent with the principle of express delegation.
The Ministry of Transportation and Communications, based on the authority under the aforesaid relevant provisions of the Highway Act, amended and published the Regulations Governing the Collection and Distribution of Automobile Fuel Use Fees. Article 2 of the said Regulations provides that any type of automobile driven on highways or the roads in city areas shall be subject to the automobile fuel use fees according to these Regulations except for those indicated in Article 4 thereof. Article 3 of the said Regulations provides that the fees shall be set at NT$2.5 per liter in the case of gasoline and NT$1.5 per liter in the case of diesel fuel, and be calculated according to the total amount of exhaust generated by cylinders, mileages and fuel use efficiency of each type of automobile, and be collected by the Ministry of Transportation and Communications or by the province (city) empowered by the Ministry according to the amounts shown in the schedule attached. The Regulations at issue provide that the owner of the automobile is the target of collection, which falls within the scope prescribed in the aforesaid Article 75 of the Highway Act. Thus, there is no overstepping the authorization granted by the Highway Act. With respect to whether the manners of collection breach the scope of authorization granted by the relevant provisions of the Highway Act, they should be comprehensively judged from the viewpoint of their relevancy as expressed by the Highway Act in its entirety whether or not the purpose of collection of the automobile fuel use fees is breached. Based on Article 27-I of the Highway Act, the primary purpose of collecting automobile fuel use fees is for the financing of costs of the maintenance, repair and safety management of highways rather than for controlling the use of fuel. If the calculation used by the authority in charge is within the scope provided by the Act and is appropriate enough to reflect the amount of use of the highways, the authority in charge can make its proper political decision after comprehensively considering the costs of collection, administrative efficiency, transportation policy, highway construction plan, environmental protection or other public interests that the Highway Act intends to protect. It should not be inferred that the purpose of the aforesaid authorization would not be achieved unless the authority in charge calculates the rates based on the amount of actual use of fuel by an individual automobile and collects the same with the fuel because the Highway Act names the fees the “automobile fuel use fees” and provides that the rates are determined by the price of fuel. The regulation at issue calculates the amount of fuel consumed by the total amount of exhaust generated by cylinders, mileage and fuel use efficiency so as to reflect how much the highway is used. This is not so precise as the calculation based on the actual amount of fuel consumed by an individual automobile; however, it is the choice made by the authority in charge after considering the costs of collection and technicalities, which does not overstep the purport of the authorization granted by the Highway Act, nor is inconsistent with the principle of legal reservation embodied in Article 23 of the Constitution.
“Those who are equal should be treated equally, unequal be treated unequally.” This is the basic meaning of the constitutional principle of equality. Therefore, if the same matters or things are treated in a discriminatory manner without any legitimate reason or different matters or things are not treated in a reasonably different manner, the principle of equality is violated. Whether the law is consistent with the principle of equality should be judged by deciding whether the purpose of the discriminatory treatment under the law at issue is constitutional, whether there is a certain level of nexus between the class and the purpose of the law, and to what level the nexus should reach. According to Article 2 of the Regulations Governing the Collection and the Distribution of Automobile Fuel Use Fees at issue, the primary purpose of the collection of automobile fuel use fees from the owner of each type of automobile is to finance the costs of maintenance, repair and safety management of highways in accordance with Article 27-I of the aforesaid Highway Act, which serves a constitutionally compelling public interest. The automobile is the main type of motor vehicle being driven on highways, even though not all owners of automobiles regularly drive on highways. To maximize the benefits of having the ownership of an automobile, a perfect, safe and accessible network of highways is the prerequisite. The owners of the automobiles will benefit either directly or indirectly regardless of whether they drive themselves or not. In addition, after the collected automobile fuel use fees are distributed to the central or local authorities, the authorities will adopt the method of income and expense list and use it exclusively for the collection of automobile fuel use fees, road traffic safety regulations, and maintenance, repair and reconstruction of the roads, thus enabling the owners of automobiles to actually enjoy the benefits of the collection of automobile fuel use fees to a certain degree. Therefore, the Regulations at issue make the owners of automobiles who are the main persons enjoying the benefits of the highway maintenance, etc., the targets for the purpose of collecting automobile fuel use fees that are used exclusively for highway maintenance, etc., does not cover all those who use the highways. The discriminatory treatment of the owners of automobiles under the said Regulation, however, is not an arbitrary choice and, therefore, is consistent with the legislative purpose of highway maintenance, etc., and in line with the purport that imposes monetary obligations other than paying taxes on certain people, which is not contrary to the principle of equality embodied in Article 7 of the Constitution. In addition, despite the fact that Article 3 of the Regulation Governing the Collection and Distribution of the Automobile Fuel Use Fees does not provide different rates of calculation for using 92 unleaded gasoline, 95 unleaded gasoline or 98 unleaded gasoline, it is not arbitrary or unreasonable in that the decision was made by the authority in charge based on such considerations as costs of collection, administrative efficiency and other public policies. Furthermore, the imposition of identical rates on all owners of automobiles using fuel has a reasonable nexus to achieving the purpose and thus does not violate the principle of equality.
As mentioned above, the primary purpose of collecting the automobile fuel use fees is to finance the costs of maintenance, repair and safety management of highways, which is a compelling public interest. As regards the manners of the collection provided in Article 3 of the aforesaid Regulations, although the amount payable is not based on the actual amount of fuel used by each automobile owner, nor on his or her use of or the level of wear and tear inflicted on highways, one cannot conclude that the calculation based on the total amount of exhaust generated by cylinders is completely unfair or unreasonable. For instance, the larger the amount of the total exhaust generated by the cylinders of an automobile, the more fuel it usually will consume; or the heavier the gross weight it carries, the harder burden it may put, and the more damage it may inflict, on the highways. In addition, distinguishing an automobile for business purposes from one for personal use in varying the frequency of collection (See Article 5 of the said Regulations) is meant to reflect the fact that an automobile for business purposes usually consumes a larger amount of fuel and is driven more often on the highway than one for personal use. As for the fact that the amount of the automobile fuel use fees collected for the use of diesel fuel per liter is lower than that for the use of gasoline, it is not only due to the considerable price difference between diesel fuel and gasoline, but also because of the considerations of transportation and industrial policies. Therefore, the collection of automobile fuel use fees as per the amount of fuel consumed according to the total amount of exhaust generated by cylinders, mileages and use efficiency and the determination of rates by distinguishing the use of gasoline or diesel fuel, based on the purpose of maintenance, repair and safety management of highways, can hardly be considered an arbitrary decision. And, there is a reasonable nexus with the achievement of the purpose of collection. Therefore, the aforesaid Article 27 of the Highway Act and Article 3 of the Regulations Governing the Collection of the Automobile Fuel Use Fees are not inconsistent with the principle of proportionality provided by Article 23 of the Constitution.
Finally, the License Plate Tax is imposed to finance the general needs of the State, and is collected from the owners or users who are licensed to use their transportation vehicles on public land or waterways. On the other hand, the Automobile Fuel Use Fees are the fees collected for the maintenance, repair and safety management of highways. Since the two are widely different in nature and purpose of collection, there is no issue of double taxation.
*Translated by Vincent C. Kuan.