[tialaramex]

Legally VAT isn't about essentials, although luxury taxes which pre-dated VAT were often specified this way.

VAT is just a tax on Value Added like it says, and the exclusions targeting items you see as essential aren't focused on somebody's idea of what's essential but are the result of various lobbying. That is, it was not the goal of the tax system to encourage petite women to buy clothes intended for children nor to punish the largest children (or their parents) with more expensive clothes that's just the consequence of a lobbied-for exemption for kid sizes.

So "But it's an essential" is a useful emotional tactic but has no legal implications for VAT.