Journal of Business Law 11/2025

The catalogue of financial instruments supporting sports activities has been supplemented as of 1 January 2022 with tax preferences available to taxpayers who incur expenditures on the tasks specified in the Act (non-profit sports clubs, non-mass sports events and sports scholarships). The algorithm adopted in the Act for the deduction of these expenses, i.e. their full amount as tax deductible expenses and additionally half of this amount as a tax relief, highlights the motivational and stimulating function of this two-element tax preference. The intention of the legislator is to encourage income taxpayers to participate in the financing of sports activities and to allocate funds from outside the public finance sector to sports activities. The aim of the article is to assess the legal regulations concerning the subjective and objective scope and the procedure for applying this tax preference. The hypothesis assuming that the possibility of total deduction of expenses higher than those actually incurred, may strongly motivate taxpayers to finance sports activities to the extent specified in the Act was verified. The effects of this tax preference observed after the first year of its validity, allow us to reasonably assume that the concept of supporting sports activities adopted by the legislator may increase taxpayers’ interest in this form of sponsoring in the following years.

The issue of water supply for firefighting purposes is not addressed in Polish legal doctrine. The Act on collective water supply and collective sewage disposal mentions this issue in only three places, and only ‘incidentally’ when regulating other matters. In fact, this legal act regulates some of the most important issues from the point of view of safety in a highly insufficient, even fragmentary manner. As a result, there is a feeling that a number of important issues have not been addressed by legislation, which has given rise to proposals de lege ferenda to cover these issues by statutory regulation. The aim of this article is therefore to analyse the solutions contained in the Supply Act with regard to the supply of water for firefighting purposes. In addition, the article will include de lege ferenda proposals.

The purpose of this article is to draw attention to the ongoing debate concerning the position of commercial law within both the European Union and Polish legal systems. This discourse unfolds on two levels: domestically, within the doctrine of Polish commercial law, and at the EU level, where discussions are underway regarding the creation of a codification of commercial law. Such a codification would not only underscore the social and economic role and significance of this branch of law but also address the need for coherent regulation. Advocates for a new Commercial Code in Poland and a European Economic/Commercial Code at the EU level emphasize the grassroots necessity for such regulation. They highlight its organizing and systematizing value, as well as its primary objective: to facilitate the conduct of business activities by entrepreneurs, both domestically and across borders. Although the visions for a new Commercial Code in Poland and the idea of a European Economic Code differ not only in their regulatory levels (national vs. intra-community) but also in their subject matter scope, encompassing various regulatory areas, they share a common goal. Both concepts aim to create coherent and consistent solutions that ultimately serve not only entrepreneurs but also society as a whole and the broader economy. Therefore, this article serves as an invitation to scholars of commercial law to engage more openly with the idea of a specific recodification of commercial law. Such a recodification need not conflict with the principle of the unity of civil law prevailing in Polish law. Moreover, it encourages participation in discussions and efforts related to the development of a European Economic/Commercial Code.

The purpose of this article is to define the essence and function of a periodic penalty payment. The specific nature of a penalty defined by the legislator as a periodic penalty payment is demonstrated by its name and the specific procedure for issuing an administrative decision concerning it. These differences justify a systemic view of its construction: from the perspective of the provisions of Section IVa of the Code of Administrative Procedure, the Environmental Protection Act (P.O.P.), and other legal regulations containing penalty structures similar to those related to running penalties. The key question seems to be whether, and if so, to what extent, the provisions of Section IVa of the Code of Administrative Procedure modify the construction of a periodic penalty payment specified in the P.O.P. provisions. Furthermore, by analyzing the construction of administrative fines, I will attempt to demonstrate that the procedure for applying administrative fines in P.O.P.s, of which the periodic penalty payment is one of the key elements, is overly complex and therefore ineffective.

Data coming from the public sector create a significant value for the digital economy (data-driven economy), because they constitute a direct element of digital products and services, but also increasingly serve as a resource for training artificial intelligence models. Legal provisions, to varying degrees, allow entrepreneurs to access and exploit these data. Three phases in the evolution of these provisions and another three phases of users’ (entrepreneurs’) information rights should be distinguished: 1) access to public information, 2) re-use of public sector information and data opening, 3) re-use of certain categories of protected data. The last two phases constitute a direct response to entrepreneurs’ demand not only for access to the information itself, but also for the establishment of conditions for its permissible exploitation for economic purposes. In our national context, what remains necessary is an understanding of their importance for the growth of a data-driven economy.

The article presents the results of the author’s scientific research conducted in the field of qualification of the legal nature of decisions taken in competitive proceedings in the area of direct management of the European Union and justifies on theoretical grounds the inadequacy of applying the institution of administrative recognition in the process of doctrinal qualification of the substantive decisions in competitive proceedings. The essence of the competition procedure is the free or bound evaluation of the evidence contained in the content of the competition project, the consequence of which is the creation of a ranking list of projects. This essence is not changed by the normative or doctrinal incorporation of the competition into the framework of administrative proceedings. As has been shown, the construction of administrative recognition is not used at all in the process of evaluating competition projects.

The article analyses an institution of active repentance in general and a new institution of financial market law, namely the agreement on the extraordinary leniency. The starting point for the research was the generalized concept of active repentance and the indication of some of its types. Against this background, the characteristic features of the institution under study were distinguished, and then its individual components were indicated and discussed along with their description. Moreover, some legal interpretation problems were identified and possible solutions were proposed. The agreement on the extraordinary leniency may be a significant tool for increasing the effectiveness of financial market public supervision.

Failure to comply with the general obligation to segregate municipal waste has the consequence of imposing a municipal waste management fee at a sanctioning rate. The aim of the study is essentially a critical commentary on the complete disregard by the Supreme Administrative Court of the extra-linguistic rules of interpretation of Article 6ka of the Act on Maintaining Cleanliness and Order in Municipalities of 13.09.1996. The interpretation applied by the Supreme Administrative Court (SAC), based exclusively on the directives of linguistic interpretation, leads to the conclusion that demonstrating even one case of non-compliance with the adopted principle of waste segregation entails the obligation to impose a fee on the interested entity at the rate applicable to non-selective collection of waste. The position presented by the SAC contradicts the will of the legislator expressed in the justification of the Act introducing the aforementioned provision and may breach the principle in dubio pro tributario. The study used a dogmatic-legal research method. The analysis covered legislation and legislative materials, as well as, additionally, the achievements of doctrine and the jurisprudence of administrative courts.