Opinion of the Advocate General — ECLI:EU:C:2013:617
Date: 2013-09-26
Language of the case: Italian
Subject matter: Competition;Right of establishment;Transport
Procedure: Reference for a preliminary ruling - decision unnecessary;Reference for a preliminary ruling - inadmissible
Origin: Italy

Summary — Judgment of the Court (Third Chamber), 13 February 2014 1. Judicial proceedings — Oral procedure — Reopening — No obligation to reopen the oral procedure in order to allow the parties to submit observations on points of law raised in the Advocate General’s Opinion (Art. 252, second para, TFEU; Rules of Procedure of the Court of Justice, Art. 83) 2. Questions referred for a preliminary ruling — Jurisdiction of the Court — Identifying the relevant elements of EU law — Reformulation of the questions (Art. 267 TFEU) 3. Questions referred for a preliminary ruling — Admissibility — Need to provide the Court with sufficient information on the factual and legislative context — Extent of the obligation in the sphere of competition — Insufficient information regarding that context — Inadmissibility (Art. 267 TFEU) 4. Questions referred for a preliminary ruling — Jurisdiction of the Court — Limits — Question raised regarding a dispute confined within a single Member State — Car and driver hire services — Economic operators established in the Member State concerned — Lack of jurisdiction of the Court (Arts 49 TFEU and 267 TFEU) 1. See the text of the decision. (see paras 23, 24) 2. See the text of the decision. (see paras 29-33, 36) 3. See the text of the decision. (see paras 38-40, 51, operative part) 4. Article 49 TFEU cannot be applied to activities which have no factor linking them with any of the situations governed by EU law and which are confined in all relevant respects within a single Member State. It is true that the Court’s answer to questions concerning fundamental freedoms of the European Union may, even in a purely internal situation, nevertheless be of use to the referring court, especially if its national law were to require it to allow a national to enjoy the same rights as those which a national of another Member State would derive from EU law in the same situation. A national of another Member State who is in the same situation as a national who is already established in the Member State concerned and is authorised to operate a car and driver hire service in a certain municipality and who is not seeking to establish himself elsewhere but is merely aiming to have the court strike out some of the conditions attached to the authorisation that he already holds would, in theory, already be pursuing an economic activity on a stable and continuous basis from an establishment located in the Member State concerned. In those circumstances, the interpretation of Article 49 TFEU on the freedom of establishment is irrelevant. (see paras 43-47, 49-51, operative part)