Opinion of the Advocate General — ECLI:EU:C:2013:652
Date: 2013-10-09
Language of the case: Italian
Subject matter: Approximation of laws;Freedom to provide services
Procedure: Reference for a preliminary ruling
Origin: Italy

summary of the judgment has been published in the Official Journal (OJ 2008 C 263, p. 4). 49 – For the sake of completeness, it must be pointed out that Unipol and the Commission suggested a different reading of the relevant Italian laws, whereby it was not excluded that the victims of car accidents could lodge an action for extra-contractual liability against the driver alone, on the basis of Articles 2043 and 2059 of the Italian Civil Code, for the possible damage which goes beyond what is recognised under Article 139 of the Private Insurance Code. However, in the absence of any more detailed factual information on that issue, I do not see any reason why, in the present proceedings, the Court should depart from its consistent case-law, according to which ‘it is not for the Court, in the context of a reference for a preliminary ruling, to rule on the interpretation of national provisions or to decide whether the referring court’s interpretation thereof is correct. The Court must take account, under the division of jurisdiction between the [EU] courts and the national courts, of the factual and legislative context, as described in the order for reference, in which the questions put to it are set’. See, among many, Case C‑153/02 Neri [2003] ECR I‑13555, paragraphs 34 and 35, and Joined Cases C‑482/01 and C‑493/01 Orfanopoulos and Oliveri [2004] ECR I‑5257, paragraph 42. 50 – See, especially, Article 3(1) of the First Directive, the second recital in the preamble to the Second Directive, as well as Article 1a of the Third Directive and the second recital in the preamble thereto. See also the case-law cited above in footnote 13. 51 – See recital 1 in the preamble to Directive 2009/103.