Opinion of the Advocate General — ECLI:EU:C:2010:166
Date: 2010-03-25
Language of the case: Dutch
Subject matter: Competition
Procedure: Reference for a preliminary ruling
Origin: Belgium

summary of the dispute in the main proceedings given above shows, the referring court is entertaining an action for annulment against a decision of the Belgian Competition Council based exclusively on national competition law, since there is no effect on trade between Member States. 36. However, irrespective of the somewhat controversial question of the conclusions that the Court must draw where it finds that a reference for a preliminary ruling is based on elements of fact and of law that have no link with European Union law, (5) it is also apparent from the reference for a preliminary ruling that many of the documents on the file lodged before the referring court should lead the latter to use the powers conferred on it by Article 75 of the WBEM to vary the decisions of the Competition Council so that Article 81 EC may be regarded as being applicable in the dispute in the main proceedings. 37. It is consistent case-law that in the context of the cooperation between the Court of Justice and the national courts provided for by Article 234 EC it is solely for the national court before which the dispute has been brought, and which must assume responsibility for the subsequent judicial decision, to determine, in the light of the particular circumstances of the case, both the need for a preliminary ruling in order to enable it to deliver judgment and the relevance of the questions which it submits to the Court. (6) 38. Where questions submitted by national courts concern the interpretation of a provision of Community law, the Court of Justice is bound, in principle, to give a ruling unless, in particular, it is obvious that the request for a preliminary ruling is in reality designed to induce the Court to give a ruling by means of a fictitious dispute, or to deliver advisory opinions on general or hypothetical questions, or that the interpretation of Community law requested bears no relation to the actual facts of the main action or its purpose. (7) 39. In that regard, I do not consider that VEBIC’s second objection, that the fact that the referring court did not give a definitive ruling on the applicability of Article 81 EC before making its reference for a preliminary ruling leads the Court to answer questions that are irrelevant or hypothetical, is persuasive either. 40. In general, I consider that at the admissibility stage it is necessary to examine whether it is apparent that, whatever answer the Court may give to a question referred for a preliminary ruling, that answer would be manifestly without impact on the outcome of the main proceedings since in that case the interpretation of Community law sought would not objectively be required for the decision to be taken by the national court. (8) 41. That is certainly not the position in the present case since, as the Competition Council and the Belgian Government have accepted, the interpretation of Regulation No 1/2003 sought could, depending on the outcome, afford the national competition authority the status of party to the main proceedings before the referring court, which has not so far been allowed under the WBEM. In addition, the fact that the referring court has not decided to give a definitive ruling on the applicability of Article 81 EC, which it intends to raise of its own motion, may very likely be explained by the purpose of its reference, which concerns the procedural rights which should be conferred on the national competition authority in connection with its task of ensuring the full effectiveness of Articles 81 EC and 82 EC. 42. Therefore, contrary to what VEBIC claims, it is in my view illogical, to say the least, that the referring court should give a definitive decision on a question which it intends to raise of its own motion without the presence of the national competition authority, even though in essence its questioning relates specifically to the possibility for that authority to obtain the status of party to the proceedings before the referring court and thus be able to lodge a response in those proceedings, a possibility which, according to the Hof van beroep te Brussel, is only likely to result from an interpretation of the provisions of Regulation No 1/2003. 43. In other words, if the referring court had given a definitive decision on the applicability of Article 81 EC, which it intends to raise of its own motion, it would have been induced to disregard one of the possible consequences of applying the provisions of European Union law which it is requesting the Court of Justice to interpret, that is to say, respect for the rights of defence of one of the parties to the proceedings. Thus, the fact that the referring court has not given a definitive decision on the applicability of Article 81 EC must not in any way form an obstacle to the admissibility of its reference for a preliminary ruling. 44. I therefore propose that the Court should declare the reference for a preliminary ruling admissible. B – Substance 1. First two questions referred 45. By its first two questions, which in my view should be considered together, the referring court asks in essence whether Articles 2, 15(3) and 35(1) of Regulation No 1/2003 directly entitle or require a national competition authority to submit written observations and present arguments in fact and/or in law to the national court before which an appeal against one of its decisions has been brought. 46. The answer to that question involves determining the extent to which national competition authorities may intervene before national courts where the latter are applying the competition law of the European Union. 47. As I noted in point 41 of my Opinion in X BV, (9) the transition from a highly centralised application of Articles 81 EC and 82 EC, as was the case under Council Regulation No 17, (10) to an arrangement providing for the decentralised implementation of the Community competition rules, as established by Regulation No 1/2003, requires the establishment of mechanisms to ensure the ‘effective’, ‘efficient’, ‘uniform’ and/or ‘coherent’ application of the provisions of Articles 81 EC and 82 EC, in accordance with the various terms used by that regulation. (11) 48. So, whilst recital 34 of Regulation No 1/2003 states that the objective of the regulation is ‘to attain a proper enforcement of Community competition law’, recital 6 states that in order to attain that objective ‘the competition authorities of the Member States should be associated more closely with [the] application [of the Community competition rules]’ and they are therefore empowered to apply all of the provisions of Articles 81 EC and 82 EC as ‘public enforcers’ (12) and in close cooperation with the Commission, in accordance with Articles 5 and 11 of that regulation. Together with the Commission, those authorities therefore form a network of public authorities applying the Community competition rules in close cooperation. (13) 49. As the Court held in X BV, the cooperation mechanisms set up in Chapter IV of Regulation No 1/2003 between the Commission, the national competition authorities and the courts of the Member States are part of the application of the general principle of sincere cooperation, referred to in Article 10 EC, which governs the relationships between the Member States and the institutions of the European Union. (14) 50. The first and second sentences of the first subparagraph of Article 15(3) of Regulation No 1/2003, which is in Chapter IV of that regulation, entitles national competition authorities of the Member States to submit written observations on their own initiative and also, with the permission of the national court concerned, oral observations to the national courts of their Member State on issues relating to the application of Article 81 EC and/or Article 82 EC. 51. In the light of the wording of that provision, that option appears to be open to national competition authorities in any situation in which a national court applies Article 81 EC and/or Article 82 EC. That might be so, for example, where a court of a Member State adjudicates in a dispute between individuals or where such a court hears an appeal against a decision of the national competition authority applying Article 81 EC and/or Article 82 EC, or again, as in the main proceedings, where such a court intends to vary such a decision and apply either of those articles. 52. However, as the Commission stated in essence at the hearing before the Court of Justice, those two examples do not constitute typical cases in which the mechanism provided for in the first subparagraph of Article 15(3) of Regulation No1/2003 would be activated. 53. In stating that ‘[f]or the purpose of the preparation of their observations only, the competition authorities of the Member States … may request the relevant court of the Member State to transmit or ensure the transmission to them of any documents necessary for the assessment of the case’, the second subparagraph of Article 15(3) of Regulation No 1/2003 would appear to assume that the mechanism provided for in the first subparagraph of Article 15(3) in respect of national competition authorities is set in motion, as a general rule, in situations in which those authorities are not entitled on any other basis to have access, even partial access, to the documents in the case before the national court. That view appears to be confirmed, by contrary inference, by recital 21 of that regulation, which states that such observations should in particular be submitted within the framework of national procedural rules safeguarding the rights of the parties. 54. Thus, where the relevant national court hears an appeal against a decision of a national competition authority, the option provided under the first sentence of the first subparagraph of Article 15(3) of Regulation No 1/2003 might generally be considered superfluous, since that authority may, in principle, enjoy the status of party to the proceedings before that court, entitling it to be informed of the content of all the documents on the file (which mainly originate from that authority) and hence to fulfil appropriately its function as a public authority responsible for applying the competition rules of the European Union effectively as a public enforcer, as required by Regulation No 1/2003. 55. That is why Regulation No 1/2003 did not expressly settle the issue of intervention by a national competition authority, since, at the time when that regulation was adopted, the Community legislature started from the premiss that each competition authority of the Member States has the right to defend its own decisions before the courts of the Member State in whose territory it is established. In that regard, it should be recalled that at the time of the adoption and entry into force of Regulation No 1/2003 the Belgian competition authority did indeed have such a right before the national courts and that it was not until 2006, when the WBEM conferred on the Competition Council the status of a court for the purposes of Belgian law, that that right was withdrawn. 56. However, first of all, I consider that in a situation such as that in the main proceedings, in which a national competition authority is not entitled to be party to appeal proceedings brought against one of its decisions even though the national court hearing the case intends to apply Article 81 EC, that authority must clearly have the right to submit observations to that court, in accordance with the mechanism provided for in the first paragraph of Article 15(3) of Regulation No 1/2003. 57. In accordance with the principle of sincere cooperation mentioned by the Court in X BV and the objective of applying the competition rules of the European Union effectively, it must be possible to exercise the option to submit written observations effectively, account being taken of the particular procedural requirements of the Member States. 58. In that regard, I have doubts as to whether, in a case such as that in the main proceedings, the national competition authority has all the effective means to really be in a position to exercise its right to submit written observations on its own initiative concerning the application of Article 81 EC and/or Article 82 EC, in accordance with the first subparagraph of Article 15(3) of Regulation No 1/2003, since, as the Competition Council and the Belgian Government confirmed at the hearing, there is no provision of national law that requires the Hof van beroep te Brussel, where it intends to raise of its own motion application of the competition rules of the European Union in a particular case, to notify the national competition authority of its intention. 59. Without such prior notification, since the national competition authority cannot, according to the WBEM and the information given in the reference for a preliminary ruling, be party to the proceedings before the referring court, that authority is, in my view, actually deprived of the right to exercise the option provided for in the first subparagraph of Article 15(3) of Regulation No 1/2003. (15) 60. Such a deficiency could be rectified if, secondly, and as the referring court is in essence requesting, the provisions of Regulation No 1/2003 required that the national competition authority enjoy the status of party to proceedings before the appeal court having jurisdiction in appeals brought against decisions of that authority or of one of its components. 61. The parties concerned which have submitted observations to the Court of Justice are divided on this issue. In essence, so far as the Polish Government and the Commission are concerned, the effective application of Articles 81 EC and 82 EC, which is the objective of the provisions of Regulation No 1/2003, requires that the national competition authorities should have full rights of standing as defendants in proceedings against one of their decisions where the national court applies those articles, without however being required to take part in such proceedings. By contrast, the Belgian Government, the Competition Council and VEBIC are essentially of the view that, since none of the provisions of Regulation No 1/2003 deals with that issue, the Member States are, by reason of procedural autonomy and the principle of subsidiarity, free to regulate it themselves. In that regard, those parties consider that the reason why the national competition authority does not have the right to defend the decision under appeal in the main proceedings before the referring court is that the Competition Council was granted the status of a court of law under the WBEM. In those circumstances, VEBIC adds that allowing a court of first instance, such as the Competition Council, the opportunity to obtain the status of party to proceedings before the court of appeal would amount to an infringement of its own rights of defence. 62. For my part and for the reasons set out below, I am inclined to consider that if the full effectiveness of Articles 81 EC and 82 EC is to be ensured, a competition authority of a Member State must, in view of the responsibility incumbent on that authority under Regulation No 1/2003, be granted the status of party to proceedings which concern the legality of a decision adopted by one of the components of that authority and which concern application of the competition rules of the European Union. 63. First, it should be noted that the Court has consistently held that, even in the absence of Community rules, the procedural autonomy enjoyed by Member States to designate the courts and tribunals having jurisdiction and to lay down the detailed procedural rules governing court actions for safeguarding rights which individuals derive from European Union law is restricted by the principles of equivalence and effectiveness. (16) 64. The Court has also held that compliance with the principle of effectiveness, the only principle that is relevant in the present case, as is required of Member States, means that the procedural rules which the latter adopt must not render in practice impossible or excessively difficult the exercise of rights conferred by Community law (17). 65. Moreover, the Court has held that each case which raises the question whether a national procedural provision renders the exercise of rights conferred by the Community legal order on individuals impossible or excessively difficult must be analysed by reference to the role of that provision in the procedure, its progress and its special features, viewed as a whole, before the various national instances. In that context, the Court considers it is necessary to take into consideration, where relevant, the principles which lie at the basis of the national legal system, such as the protection of the rights of the defence, the principle of legal certainty and the proper conduct of the proceedings. (18) 66. The first objection raised by the Competition Council to the applicability of that case-law in a case such as that in the main proceedings, which should in my view be rejected, is that the principle of effectiveness protects only those rights which individuals derive from European Union law. 67. Admittedly, there is no precedent in the context of which the Court has considered application of the principle of effectiveness in favour of national authorities from the point of view of whether national procedural rules should not be applied. 68. However, that is not really the question which arises in this case. It is more whether the principle of the effectiveness of European Union law precludes application of national procedural rules which render excessively difficult or in practice impossible the exercise of the specific obligations incumbent on national competition authorities under provisions of European Union law, in this case, those of Regulation No 1/2003. 69. As stated above, in the context of decentralising application of the competition rules of the European Union, Regulation No 1/2003 confers on the national competition authorities designated by each Member State the task of applying Articles 81 EC and 82 EC effectively as public enforcers. Those authorities, together with the Commission, are therefore entrusted with the task of ensuring that fundamental provisions essential for the functioning of the internal market are effectively applied. (19) 70. That obligation expressly includes, in particular, the right for a body to submit written observations on its own initiative to the courts of the Member State concerned, in accordance with Article 15(3) of that regulation, on issues relating to the application of Articles 81 EC and 82 EC, and, with the permission of those courts, to submit oral observations. 71. It also requires, in my view, that those authorities should be heard in any court proceedings concerning the legality of their own decisions, where the authorities and/or the national court consider Article 81 EC and/or Article 82 EC to be applicable. 72. Indeed, if that were not the case, the effectiveness of those articles would be significantly reduced, since a national competition authority would have no way of defending, before the national court hearing the case, the position it had adopted as a public enforcer, or of being heard by that court in respect of any issue which that court considered it its duty to raise of its own motion. 73. In the present case, it should be noted that Article 75 of the WBEM gives the Hof van beroep te Brussel unlimited jurisdiction, both as regards assessing the existence of an infringement of Articles 81 EC and 82 EC and as regards the level of any fine that may be imposed on the undertakings to have been investigated; that jurisdiction includes the possibility, which is moreover expressly mentioned in the same article of the WBEM, of taking into consideration developments post-dating the Competition Council’s decision appealed against before the Hof van beroep. 74. In those circumstances, not to afford the national competition authority the status of party to the proceedings and thus prevent it from defending the decision it adopted as a public enforcer carries the risk that the appeal court might be totally ‘captive’ to the pleas in law and arguments put forward by the appellant undertaking(s) in the appeal against the Competition Council’s decision. 75. In a field such as that of establishing infringements of the competition rules, which involves complex legal and economic assessments and the imposition of fines that are often the subject of disputes before national or European courts, the very existence of such a risk is likely to compromise exercise of the specific obligation on national competition authorities under Regulation No 1/2003 to ensure effective application of Articles 81 EC and 82 EC. 76. Furthermore, to deny a national competition authority the status of party to the proceedings in a situation such as that in the main proceedings also means that that authority is not in a position to exercise other remedies, including lodging an appeal on a point of law against the appeal court’s decision annulling and/or varying the decision adopted by the Competition Council, as the Belgian Government and the Competition Council accepted at the hearing before the Court of Justice. 77. In such circumstances, therefore, no public authority whose duty it is to ensure the full effectiveness of the competition rules of the European Union under Regulation No 1/2003 will be able to challenge any possibly incorrect interpretation of those rules on the part of the Hof van beroep te Brussel. 78. It is possible to imagine that the national competition authority might exercise its right to submit observations to the Hof van Cassatie (Court of Cassation) under Article 15(3) of Regulation No 1/2003. However, the existence of that possibility would not rectify the deficiencies mentioned above, since activation of the mechanism provided for in Article 15(3) of Regulation No 1/2003 would, in any event, be subject to prior introduction of an appeal on a point of law by one of the parties to the proceedings before the Hof van beroep te Brussel. It is clear that those parties may, for different subjective reasons, consider that it is not in their interest to bring such an appeal. 79. Hence, the national competition authority is, in my view, placed in a situation in which exercise of its obligations under Regulation No 1/2003 will be rendered excessively difficult by national procedural rules which do not allow it to intervene as a party to court proceedings concerning one of its decisions in which application of Article 81 EC and/or Article 82 EC is involved. 80. Furthermore, contrary to the contention of the Belgian Government and the Competition Council, the fact that it is impossible for the national competition authority to be a party to proceedings before the Hof van beroep te Brussel cannot be rectified in this case by the option afforded to the Federal Minister of the Economy to become a party. It is common ground that the Minister was not designated by the Kingdom of Belgium as the ‘national competition authority’ for the purposes of Regulation No 1/2003 and is not therefore responsible, under that regulation, for ensuring the effective application of Articles 81 EC and 82 EC as a public enforcer. 81. Nor can it be rectified by the possibility for the Hof van beroep te Brussel to request the Auditoraat for a further investigation, since such a measure has by its nature a limited scope and activation of it depends both on the documents submitted to that court and on the latter giving its consent. 82. Lastly, the argument put forward by VEBIC and the Belgian Government that the judicial status granted to the Competition Council by the WBEM precludes the national competition authority being a party to proceedings before the Hof van beroep te Brussel is no more persuasive. As is apparent from Article 1 of the WBEM, the Competition Council is only one of the components of the national competition authority designated by the Kingdom of Belgium in accordance with Regulation No 1/2003, and, as the Belgian Government accepted at the hearing before the Court of Justice, that authority is a hybrid, being part-judicial and part-administrative. It is for the same reason that VEBIC’s argument, put forward at the hearing before the Court of Justice, that to grant a national court of first instance the status of party to the main proceedings would infringe its own rights of defence, should be rejected. That is not the requirement laid down in Regulation No 1/2003. 83. Hence, although effective application of Articles 81 EC and 82 EC requires, in my view, that the national authority responsible for implementing them as a public enforcer in its own Member State should be given the opportunity to be a party to the proceedings before the referring court called upon to rule on those provisions, the law of the European Union requires also that that authority should enjoy the rights conferred on it by that status, first of which is the right that the principle that the parties should be heard should be observed. 84. In that regard, I would point out that the Court has held that that basic principle of law is infringed where a judicial decision is founded on facts and documents which the parties, or one of them, have not had an opportunity to examine and on which they have therefore been unable to comment, (20) and that the principle that the parties should be heard also implies, as a rule, a right for the parties to be apprised of pleas in law raised by those courts of their own motion, on which they intend basing their decisions, and to discuss them, (21) considerations which stem also from compliance with Article 6(1) of the European Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms, signed in Rome on 4 November 1950. (22) 85. It is also in that light that it is easy to understand the reasons why the referring court, which intended to base its decision to intervene on Article 81 EC without first having been requested to do so by the appellant, decided to stay proceedings and question the Court about the need to ensure, in pursuance of the provisions of Regulation No 1/2003, that representation of the national competition authority and full exercise by the latter of its rights of defence be safeguarded. 86. The concern expressed by the referring court appears to me to be all the more understandable since, under the WBEM, that court has unlimited jurisdiction and is thus entitled to take into consideration factors which arose after the decision adopted by the Competition Council and to substitute its own decision for the Competition Council’s decision. There is no doubt that the referring court rightly appears to consider that exercise of such jurisdiction cannot be absolved from compliance with procedural rules stemming from the principle that the parties have the right to be heard. (23) 87. As a result of all these considerations, I take the view that in the light of the obligation incumbent on national competition authorities to ensure the effective application of Articles 81 EC and 82 EC under Regulation No 1/2003, that regulation should be interpreted as meaning that national competition authorities must be able to obtain the status of party to judicial proceedings concerning the legality of one of their decisions and the application of Article 81 EC and/or Article 82 EC. 88. However, in reply to the referring court’s second question, and as all the parties concerned have maintained, effective application of Articles 81 EC and 82 EC cannot go so far as to require a national competition authority to defend the legality of its decisions in all cases without exception. 89. However, it should be added, as the Commission rightly maintained, that if a national competition authority were, almost as a matter of course, not to enter an appearance, both the general principle of sincere cooperation and the effectiveness of Articles 81 EC and 82 EC would be jeopardised. 2. Third and fourth questions referred 90. By its third question, raised only in the event of the first two questions being answered in the affirmative, the referring court requests the Court of Justice in essence to state whether it falls to the national competition authority which is competent to take the decisions set out in Article 5 of Regulation No 1/2003 to participate in the appeal proceedings. By its fourth question, the referring court asks whether the answers given to the first three questions are different if one of the components of the national competition authority has judicial status, or if a body belonging to the authority conducts an investigation that, depending on circumstances, leads to the final decision of the judicial component of that authority. 91. Although I suggest that an affirmative answer should be given only to the first question, the third and fourth questions are still, even in that eventuality, wholly relevant. It is therefore appropriate to answer them. 92. So far as the wording of the questions is concerned, I would point out that, under the provisions of the WBEM, the Kingdom of Belgium has designated a single competition authority for the purposes of Regulation No 1/2003, composed of two separate bodies, in accordance with Article 1 of the WBEM. The third and fourth questions therefore concern only the allocation of powers between the different components of that authority. 93. That being the case, the answer to those questions seems to me to lie in the procedural autonomy of the Member States. 94. Although, as I stated above, the Member States are required to grant the national competition authority responsible for ensuring effective application of Articles 81 EC and 82 EC as a public enforcer the right to be a party to proceedings concerning one of its decisions, those same States none the less remain competent, in the absence of European Union rules, to designate the body or bodies within that authority which will have the power to activate such a right. The effective application of Articles 81 EC and 82 EC does not, in my view, require that the discretion of Member States be restricted in that regard. 95. That answer and the answers to the first two questions referred to the Court for a preliminary ruling is not, in my view, different if one of the components of the national competition authority possesses the status of a court or tribunal within the meaning of domestic law. (24) 96. If the Court of Justice were to agree with my suggested answers to the four questions referred it is probable that the national legislature would have to amend the WBEM in order to grant one of the components of the competition authority the status of party to proceedings before the Hof van beroep te Brussel. 97. However, in the main proceedings in the present case it is very likely that the referring court cannot wait for intervention by the national legislature in order to resolve this issue. 98. Unless the referring court considers it should stay proceedings until the entry into force of the amendment to the WBEM it must – in accordance with the obligation incumbent on the authorities of the Member States under Article 10 EC to take any appropriate measure, whether general or particular, to ensure fulfilment of the obligations arising out of Community law – interpret domestic law as far as is at all possible in a way which accords with the requirements of Community law. (25) 99. The obligation thus imposed on the national court is limited to ‘as far as is … possible’, that is to say, it applies only in cases in which the wording of the national legislation in question leaves a margin for different interpretations. The scope of such an obligation does not therefore go so far as to require an interpretation of domestic law contra legem. (26) 100. Although that assessment must be made by the referring court, an interpretation of the WBEM in accordance with the requirement to ensure full effectiveness of Articles 81 EC and 82 EC does not appear to me to be impossible in view, on the one hand, of the fact that the national competition authority designated by the Kingdom of Belgium in accordance with Regulation No 1/2003 has a dual, part-administrative, part-judicial, structure and, on the other hand, of the fact noted in the reference for a preliminary ruling that the sole clear intention of the national legislature was to exclude the option for the judicial component of the authority to enjoy the status of party to proceedings before the Hof van beroep te Brussel in the context of an appeal brought against a decision adopted by the Competition Council. 101. I therefore suggest that the answer to the third and fourth questions from the referring court should be that, in the absence of European Union rules, the Member States remain competent to designate the body which, within the national competition authority designated under the provisions of Regulation No 1/2003, has the power to exercise the right to be a party to proceedings relating to one of the decisions of that authority and concerning the application of Article 81 EC and/or Article 82 EC, irrespective of whether one of that authority’s components has the status of a court or tribunal for the purposes of domestic law. VI – Conclusion 102. For all the above considerations, I propose that the questions referred for a preliminary ruling by the Hof van beroep te Brussel should be answered as follows: (1) In the light of the obligation incumbent on national competition authorities to ensure the effective application of Articles 81 EC and 82 EC under Council Regulation (EC) No 1/2003 of 16 December 2002 on the implementation of the rules on competition laid down in Articles 81 and 82 of the Treaty, that regulation should be interpreted as meaning that national competition authorities must be able to obtain the status of party to judicial proceedings concerning the legality of one of their decisions and the application of Article 81 EC and/or Article 82 EC. However, the effective application of Articles 81 EC and 82 EC cannot go so far as to require a national competition authority to defend the legality of its decisions in all cases without exception. (2) In the absence of European Union rules, the Member States remain competent to designate the body which, within the national competition authority designated under the provisions of Regulation No 1/2003, has the power to exercise the right to be a party to proceedings relating to one of the decisions of that authority and concerning the application of Article 81 EC and/or Article 82 EC, irrespective of whether one of that authority’s components has the status of a court or tribunal for the purposes of domestic law. 1 – Original language: French. 2 – OJ 2003 L 1, p. 1. 3 – Belgisch Staatsblad of 29 September 2006, p. 50613. 4 – Article 79 of the WBEM (not relevant to the main proceedings) provides that the Competition Council is to hear appeals against decisions taken by the sectoral regulatory authorities. Under Article 81 of the WBEM, an appeal on a point of law may be brought before the Court of Cassation against decisions taken by the Competition Council under Article 79 of the WBEM. 5 – In that regard, it is possible to list at least four lines of case-law that coexist. As regards the first and oldest of these, the Court holds that the rules of the EC Treaty are not applicable to a situation which is confined in all respects within a single Member State (see, in particular, Case C‑97/98 Jägerskiöld [1999] ECR I‑7319, paragraph 45, and Order of 19 June 2008 in Case C‑104/08 Kurt, paragraph 20). As regards the second line of case-law, the Court gives an answer ruling that the relevant European Union law does not preclude the national regulations at issue (see, in particular, the operative part of the Order of 5 April 2004 in Case C‑3/02 Mosconi and Ordine degli Ingegneri di Verona e Provincia; Order of 21 January 2008 in Case C‑229/07 Mayeur, paragraph 20, and Order of 17 March 2009 in Case C‑217/08 Mariano, paragraphs 30 and 31). According to the third line of case-law, the Court considers that it has no jurisdiction to answer the questions raised (see, in particular, Case C‑299/05 Kremzow [1997] ECR I‑2629, paragraph 15; Order in Case C‑328/04 Vajnai [2003] ECR I‑8577, paragraph 13; Order of 25 January 2007 in Case C‑302/06 Koval’ský, paragraphs 20 and 23, and Order of 16 January 2008 in Case C‑361/07 Polier, paragraphs 11 and 16). According to the fourth line of case-law, the Court accepts the admissibility of questions referred for a preliminary ruling that are based on facts confined within a single Member State, in particular if the national law requires the national court to allow nationals of the Member State of that court to enjoy the same rights as those which those nationals would derive from European Union law in the same situation (see, among others, Case C‑448/98 Guimont [2000] ECR I‑10663, paragraph 23; Case C‑300/01 Salzmann [2003] ECR I‑4899, paragraphs 33 to 35, and Case C‑380/05 Centro Europa 7 [2008] ECR I‑349 paragraph 69). 6 – See, in particular, Case C‑217/05 Confederación Española de Empresarios de Estaciones de Servicio [2006] ECR I‑11987, paragraph 16, and Case C‑260/07 Pedro IV Servicios [2009] ECR I‑2437, paragraph 28. 7 – See, to that effect, Confederación Española de Empresarios de Estaciones de Servicio, paragraph 17 and case-law cited. 8 – See Case C‑206/99 SONAE [2001] ECR I‑4679, paragraphs 45 and 46, and point 40 of my Opinion in Pedro IV Servicios. 9 – Case C‑429/07 [2009] ECR I-0000. 10 – Regulation of 6 February 1962, First Regulation implementing Articles [81] and [82] of the Treaty, OJ, English Special Edition 1959-1962, p. 87, as last amended by Council Regulation (EC) No 1216/1999 of 10 June 1999 (OJ 1999 L 148, p. 5). 11 – In the French language version of Regulation No 1/2003, the term ‘effectif[ve]’ is used in recitals 5 and 8 and, adverbially, in Article 35(1) of that regulation; the term ‘efficace’ is used in recitals 6 and 34; the term ‘uniforme’ is used in recital 22 and in the title of Article 16 of Regulation No 1/2003; the term ‘cohérent(e)’ is used in recitals 14, 17, 19 and 21 and in Article 15(3) of Regulation No 1/2003. As I observed in point 33 of my Opinion in X BV, these differences are not necessarily relevant in all the language versions of Regulation No 1/2003. 12 – See, in particular, recital 35 of Regulation No 1/2003. 13 – Recital 15 of Regulation No 1/2003. 14 – Paragraphs 20 and 21. 15 – I would add, for such purposes as this may serve, that the fact that, according to recital 21 of Regulation No 1/2003 and Article 76 of the WBEM, the national competition authority is notified of the appeal brought against its decision makes no difference, since in the present case VEBIC is by no means complaining that the Competition Council failed to apply Article 81 EC. 16 – See, to that effect, Joined Cases C‑430/93 and C‑431/93 Van Schijndel and van Veen [1995] ECR I‑4705, paragraph 17; Case C‑129/00 Commission v Italy [2003] ECR I‑14637, paragraph 25; Joined Cases C‑295/04 to C‑298/04 Manfredi and Others [2006] ECR I‑6619, paragraphs 62 and 71; Joined Cases C‑222/05 to C‑225/05 van der Weerd and Others [2007] ECR I‑4233, paragraph 28, and Case C‑268/06 Impact [2008] ECR I‑2483, paragraphs 44 to 46. 17 – See, in particular, Van Schijndel and van Veen, paragraph 17; van der Weerd and Others, paragraph 28, and Impact, paragraph 46. 18 – See, to that effect, van der Weerd and Others, paragraph 33 and case-law cited. 19 – See, to that effect, Case C‑126/97 Eco Swiss [1999] ECR I‑3055, paragraph 36. 20 – Joined Cases 42/59 and 49/59 Snupat v High Authority [1961] ECR 53, at 84; Case C‑480/99 P Plant and Others v Commission and South Wales Small Mines [2002] ECR I‑265, paragraph 24; Case C‑199/99 P Corus UK v Commission [2003] ECR I‑11177, paragraph 19, and Case C‑89/08 P Commission v Irelandand Others [2009] ECR I‑0000, paragraph 52. 21 – Commission v Ireland and Others, paragraph 55. See also Case C‑197/09 RX-II M v EMEA [2009] ECR I‑0000, paragraph 57. 22 – See, to that effect, Case C‑450/06 Varec [2008] ECR I‑581, paragraphs 46 and 47, and Commission v Ireland and Others, paragraphs 54 to 58. 23 – See to that effect, as regards compliance with such a principle by European Union courts, M v EMEA, paragraph 58. 24 – In that regard, it should be pointed out that such status is without prejudice to the concept of a national court or tribunal within the meaning of Article 234 EC. See, with regard to the non-judicial nature of the Greek national competition authority within the meaning of Article 234 EC, Case C‑53/03 Syfait and Others [2005] ECR I‑4609, paragraphs 30 to 37. 25 – See in particular to that effect Case C‑115/08 ČEZ [2009] ECR I-10265, paragraph 138). 26 – See, to that effect, among others, Case C‑54/96 Dorsch Consult [1997] ECR I‑4961, paragraph 45.