ddrg/super_eurlex huggingface dataset:
17

In those circumstances, the Vilniaus apygardos administracinis teismas (Regional Administrative Court, Vilnius, Lithuania) decided to stay the proceedings and to refer the following questions to the Court for a preliminary ruling: ‘(1) Does Article 26(5) of Directive 2002/22 … regulate the mandatory transmission of location information where calls are made from mobile telephones without SIM cards? (2) Where a Member State’s national legislation allows [112] to be called without a SIM card, does that mean that location information for such emergency calls has to be established in accordance with Article 26(5) of Directive 2002/22 …? (3) Is the national legislation laid down in point 4.5.4 of the Procedure for access [to the Emergency Services] which, inter alia, provides that public mobile network providers are to transmit location information with an accuracy of base station (sector) coverage (Cell‑ID), but which does not specify the minimum accuracy (in terms of distance) with which base stations must establish the caller’s location or the density (in terms of distance) at which base stations must be distributed, compatible with Article 26(5) of Directive 2002/22 … which provides that competent regulatory authorities are to lay down criteria for the accuracy and reliability of the caller location information provided? (4) If the answers to the first question and/or second question are such that a Member State has to ensure that location information is established in accordance with Article 26(5) of Directive 2002/22 … and/or the answer to the third question is such that the national legislation is incompatible with Article 26(5) of Directive 2002/22 … which provides that competent regulatory authorities are to lay down criteria for the accuracy and reliability of the caller location information provided, is a national court required, when deciding on the issue of compensation for damage, to establish a direct causal link between the breach of EU law and the damage sustained by the individuals, or is it sufficient to establish an indirect causal link between the breach of EU law and the damage sustained by the individuals, where, under the provisions of national law and/or national case-law, such an indirect causal link is sufficient to give rise to liability?’
7

Article 8 of the directive provides: ‘1. On a merger, division or exchange of shares, the allotment of securities representing the capital of the receiving or acquiring company to a shareholder of the transferring or acquired company in exchange for securities representing the capital of the latter company shall not, of itself, give rise to any taxation of the income, profits or capital gains of that shareholder. … 4. Paragraphs 1 and 3 shall apply only if the shareholder does not attribute to the securities received a value for tax purposes higher than the value the securities exchanged had immediately before the merger, division or exchange of shares. … 6. The application of paragraph 1 shall not prevent the Member States from taxing the gain arising out of the subsequent transfer of securities received in the same way as the gain arising out of the transfer of securities existing before the acquisition. 7. For the purpose of this article, “value for tax purposes” shall mean the value on the basis of which any gain or loss would be computed for the purposes of tax upon the income, profits or capital gains of a shareholder of the company. …’
5

The pension scheme at issue in the main proceedings was created in the form of a trust by Safeway in 1978. Clause 19 of the Trust Deed governing that pension scheme (‘the amendment clause’) essentially allows that pension scheme, including the value of its benefits, to be amended retroactively, as of the date of a written announcement to the members, by means of a trust deed. That clause is drafted as follows: ‘The Principal Company may at any time and from time to time with the consent of the Trustees by Supplemental Deed executed by the Principal Company and the Trustees alter or add to any of the trusts powers and provisions of the Scheme including this Trust Deed and the Rules and all Deeds and other instruments in writing supplemental to this Trust Deed and the Deeds specified in the Second Schedule hereto and may exercise such powers so as to take effect from a date specified in the Supplemental Deed which may be the date of such Deed or the date of any prior written announcement to Members of the alteration or addition or a date occurring at any reasonable time previous or subsequent to the date of such Deed so as to give the amendment or addition retrospective or future effects as the case may be.’
27

In those circumstances, the Verwaltungsgericht Wien (Administrative Court, Vienna) decided to stay the proceedings and to refer the following question to the Court for a preliminary ruling: ‘Is Article 288 TFEU, in conjunction with Article 5(4) [of Directive 91/676] or with Article 5(5) of, in conjunction with Annex I A, point 2 to [that directive], to be interpreted as meaning that (a) a public water supplier, … in so far as it is concerned by what are claimed to be inadequate action plans (as the value of 50 mg/l nitrate concentration in the water in this water supplier’s area is exceeded) and must for that reason take measures to treat the water … (b) a consumer … authorised by law to use the water from his own domestic well … in so far as he is concerned by what are claimed to be inadequate action plans and the value of 50 mg/l nitrate concentration in the water of his water intake (domestic well) is exceeded, with the result that he is unable to exercise his legal right to make limited use of the groundwaters on his property … (c) a municipality, which … uses or makes available a communal well … only for non-drinking water …, in so far as [due to what are claimed to be inadequate action plans] the value of 50 mg/l nitrate concentration in the water at the source is exceeded and therefore a use as drinking water is not available, [are directly concerned within the meaning of the case-law of the Court of Justice of the European Union, in this case possibly by failure to implement Directive 91/676 and are therefore granted subjective rights under that directive] – to amendment of an action programme already adopted nationally to implement Directive [91/676] (pursuant to Article 5(4) of [that directive]) in such a way that stricter measures with the aim of attaining the objectives of Article 1 of [that directive] and specifically attaining a value of up to a maximum 50 mg/l nitrate concentration in the groundwaters at individual intake points are thus adopted? – to the adoption of additional measures or reinforced actions (pursuant to Article 5(5) of Directive [91/676] with the aim of achieving the objectives laid down in Article 1(1) of [that directive] and specifically attaining a value of up to a maximum 50 mg/l nitrate concentration in the groundwaters at individual intake points? In all three cases the protection of consumer health is safeguarded in any event either — in cases (b) and (c) — by taking the water from water suppliers providing it (with compulsory connection and a right to connection) or — in case (a) — by the corresponding treatment measures.’
5

Article 33 of that directive provides: ‘1. Without prejudice to Article 36(1), where excise goods which have already been released for consumption in one Member State are held for commercial purposes in another Member State in order to be delivered or used there, they shall be subject to excise duty and excise duty shall become chargeable in that other Member State. For the purposes of this Article, ‘holding for commercial purposes’ shall mean the holding of excise goods by a person other than a private individual or by a private individual for reasons other than his own use and transported by him, in accordance with Article 32. 2. The chargeability conditions and rate of excise duty to be applied shall be those in force on the date on which duty becomes chargeable in that other Member State. 3. The person liable to pay the excise duty which has become chargeable shall be, depending on the cases referred to in paragraph 1, the person making the delivery or holding the goods intended for delivery, or to whom the goods are delivered in the other Member State. 4. Without prejudice to Article 38, where excise goods which have already been released for consumption in one Member State move within the [European Union] for commercial purposes, they shall not be regarded as held for those purposes until they reach the Member State of destination, provided that they are moving under cover of the formalities set out in Article 34. …’
28

In those circumstances, the Bayerischer Verwaltungsgerichtshof (Higher Administrative Court of Bavaria) decided to stay the proceedings and to refer the following question to the Court for a preliminary ruling: ‘Are – the requirement laid down in the second subparagraph of Article 4(3) [TEU], according to which the Member States must take any appropriate measure to ensure fulfilment of the obligations arising out of the Treaties or resulting from the acts of the institutions of the European Union, – the principle of effective implementation of EU law by the Member States, which is established in, inter alia, Article 197(1) [TFEU], – the right to an effective remedy guaranteed by the first paragraph of Article 47 of the [Charter], – the obligation devolving on the Contracting States to ensure effective remedies in environmental matters, which arises from the first sentence of Article 9(4) of the [Aarhus Convention], – the obligation devolving on the Member States to ensure effective legal protection in the fields covered by EU law, which is established in the second subparagraph of Article 19(1) TEU, to be interpreted as meaning that a German court is entitled — and possibly even obliged — to impose coercive detention on office holders involved in the exercise of the official authority … of a German Federal Land in order thereby to enforce the obligation of that Federal Land to update an air quality plan, within the meaning of Article 23 of Directive [2008/50], with specific minimum content if that Federal Land has been ordered, by way of a final judgment, to carry out an update having that specific minimum content, and – the Federal Land has been threatened with and subjected to financial penalties on several occasions without success, – threats of financial penalties and the imposition of financial penalties do not result in a significant persuasive effect even if higher amounts than before are threatened and imposed, for the reason that the payment of penalties does not involve actual losses for the Federal Land against which a final judgment has been given, but rather, in this respect, there is merely a transfer of the amount imposed in each case from one accounting item within the Land’s budget to another accounting item within the Land’s budget, – the Federal Land against which a final judgment has been given has stated to the courts and publicly — inter alia before parliament via its most senior political office-holder — that it will not fulfil the judicially imposed obligations in connection with air quality planning, – while national law does in principle provide for the instrument of coercive detention for the purpose of enforcing judicial decisions, case-law of the national constitutional court precludes the application of the relevant provision to a situation of the nature involved here, and – for a situation of the nature involved here, national law does not provide for coercive instruments that are more expedient than threats and imposition of financial penalties but are less invasive than detention, and recourse to such coercive instruments does not come into consideration from a substantive point of view either?’
1.

Article 46(3) of Directive 2013/32/EU of the European Parliament and of the Council of 26 June 2013 on common procedures for granting and withdrawing international protection, read in the light of Article 47 of the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union, must be interpreted as not precluding national legislation which confers solely on courts or tribunals the power to annul decisions of the competent authorities in matters of international protection, to the exclusion of the power to amend those decisions. However, if the file is referred back to the competent administrative authority, a new decision should be adopted within a short period of time and in compliance with the assessment contained in the judgment annulling the decision. Moreover, where a national court has found — after making a full and ex nunc examination of all the relevant elements of fact and law submitted by an applicant for international protection — that, under the criteria laid down by Directive 2011/95/EU of the European Parliament and of the Council of 13 December 2011 on standards for the qualification of third-country nationals or stateless persons as beneficiaries of international protection, for a uniform status for refugees or for persons eligible for subsidiary protection, and for the content of the protection granted, the applicant concerned must be granted such protection on the ground that he or she relied on in support of his or her application, but after which the administrative authority adopts a contrary decision without establishing that new elements have arisen that justify a new assessment of the international protection needs of the applicant, that court must, where national law does not provide it with any means of ensuring that its judgment is complied with, amend that decision which does not comply with its previous judgment and substitute its own decision for it as to the application for international protection, by disapplying, if necessary, the national law that prohibits it from proceeding in that way.
6

Article 3 of Regulation No 1484/95 provides: ‘1. The additional duty shall be established on the basis of the [CIF] import price of the consignment in question in accordance with the provisions of Article 4. 2. When the [CIF] import price per 100 kg of a consignment is higher than the applicable representative price referred to in Article 2(1), the importer shall present to the competent authorities of the importing Member States at least the following proofs: – the purchasing contract, or any other equivalent document, – the insurance contract, – the invoice, – the certificate of origin (where applicable), – the transport contract, – and, in the case of sea transport, the bill of lading. 3. In the case referred to in paragraph 2, the importer must lodge the security referred to in Article 248(1) of Regulation (EEC) No 2454/93, equal to the difference between the amount of additional import duty calculated on the basis of the representative price applicable to the product in question and the amount of additional import duty calculated on the basis of the [CIF] import price of the consignment in question. 4. The importer shall have two months from the sale of the products in question, subject to a limit of nine months from the date of acceptance of the declaration of release for free circulation, to prove that the consignment was disposed of under conditions confirming the correctness of the prices referred to in paragraph 2. Failure to meet one or other of these deadlines shall entail the loss of the security lodged. However, the time limit of nine months may be extended by the competent authorities by a maximum of three months at the request of the importer, which must be duly substantiated. The security lodged shall be released to the extent that proof of the conditions of disposal is provided to the satisfaction of the customs authorities. Otherwise, the security shall be forfeit by way of payment of the additional duties. 5. If on verification the competent authorities establish that the requirements of this Article have not been met, they shall recover the duty due in accordance with Article 220 of [Council] Regulation (EEC) No 2913/92 [of 12 October 1992 establishing the Community Customs Code (OJ 1992 L 302, p. 1)]. The amount of the duty to be recovered or remaining to be recovered shall include interest from the date the goods were released for free circulation up to the date of recovery. The interest rate applied shall be that in force for recovery operations under national law.’
11

In a decision of 24 September 2009 (‘the Competition Authority’s decision’), the Competition Authority found that, by (i) determining the level and structure of the interchange fee, which were uniformly applicable to Visa and MasterCard as well as to all the banks, (ii) establishing a framework for such an agreement in their internal rules and (iii) facilitating it, the 22 banks that were party to the MIF Agreement, and Visa and MasterCard, entered into an anticompetitive agreement that did not fall within any exemption. It stated that, by that conduct, from the time when they signed up to the MIF Agreement — the starting date of the anticompetitive conduct being that of the entry into force of the Law on unfair market practices on 1 January 1997 in respect of the banks that concluded the MIF Agreement, while that date varied in respect of the banks that signed up to that agreement subsequently — until 30 July 2008 they infringed Paragraph 11(1) of that law and, after 1 May 2004, they infringed Article 101 TFEU. That conduct constituted not only a restriction of competition ‘by object’, in that the purpose of the MIF Agreement was anticompetitive conduct, but also a restriction ‘by effect’, in that that agreement had a restrictive effect on competition. The Competition Authority imposed fines in varying amounts on the seven banks that had initially concluded the MIF Agreement, and on Visa and MasterCard.
5

Paragraph 44 of the Strafgesetzbuch (Criminal Code), in the version applicable to the facts in the main proceedings (‘the StGB’), entitled ‘Driving ban’, provides: ‘(1) If a person has been sentenced to imprisonment or to a fine for an offence which he committed whilst or in connection with the driving of a motor vehicle or in breach of the duties of a driver of a motor vehicle, the court may prohibit him from driving any type of motor vehicle, or any specific type, on public roads for a period of between one and three months. A driving ban shall typically be imposed in cases of a conviction under Paragraph 315c(1), No 1(a), (3), or Paragraph 316 if there has been no withdrawal of permission to drive pursuant to Paragraph 69. (2) A driving ban shall take effect when the judgment becomes final. Throughout the period of its application, national and international driving licences shall be kept by a German authority. This shall also apply if the driving licence was issued by an authority of a Member State of the European Union or of another State party to the Agreement on the European Economic Area, as long as the holder’s habitual residence is in Germany. The driving ban shall be endorsed on other foreign driving licences. (3) If a driving licence is to be kept by the official services or the driving ban is to be endorsed on a foreign driving licence, the duration of the ban shall be calculated only from the day on which this takes place. The duration of the ban shall not include the period during which the person accused was held in custody in an establishment by order of the authorities.’
25

The appellant in the main proceedings therefore lodged an appeal before the referring court, by which he claims that the letting of the immovable property which he co-owns is an ancillary transaction for the purposes of Article 152(2) of the Tax Code and the income deriving from it does not need to be included in calculation of turnover for the purposes of applying the special scheme for small enterprises. Taking the view that the resolution of the dispute before it required an interpretation of provisions of the VAT Directive, the Curtea de Apel Timişoara (Court of Appeal, Timişoara, Romania) decided to stay the proceedings and refer the following questions to the Court for a preliminary ruling: ‘(1) In circumstances such as those here at issue, in which a natural person carries on an economic activity by practising several liberal professions and by letting out immovable property and thereby obtaining income of a continuous nature, do the provisions of Article 288 [first paragraph] point 4 of [the VAT] Directive … require the identification of a particular professional activity as being the principal activity in order to verify whether the letting can be classified as an ancillary transaction thereto and, if so, on the basis of what criteria is that principal activity to be identified, or must those provisions be interpreted as meaning that all of the professional activities by which the economic activity of that natural person is carried on constitute the “principal activity”? (2) In the event that the immovable property let by a natural person to a third party is not intended and used for the performance of the remainder of his economic activity, so that it is not possible to establish any connection between that letting and the practice of the various professions of that person, do the provisions of Article 288 [first paragraph] point (4) of [the VAT] Directive … permit the classification of the letting as an “ancillary transaction”, with the consequence that it is excluded from the calculation of the turnover which serves as a reference for the purpose of applying the special exemption scheme for small undertakings? (3) In the situation described in the second question, is it relevant to the classification of the letting transaction as “ancillary” that it is for the benefit of a third party – a legal person of which the natural person is a shareholder and director – established in the property let and carrying on professional activities of the same kind as those of the natural person in question?’
43

In the present case, although it would certainly have been useful for the referring court to identify more precisely the exact legal or contractual provision which constitutes the source of the obligation referred to in its question and relates to the attainment by EMM of a certain turnover during a relevant period, the fact remains that, having regard to the nature and scope of the provision of EU law whose interpretation is sought, this lack of precision does not preclude a sufficient understanding of the context in which that question arises. It is apparent, in particular, from the information before the Court that the outcome of the dispute in the main proceedings depends on whether an irregularity, within the meaning of Article 2(7) of Regulation No 1083/2006, may be attributed to EMM. Notwithstanding the abovementioned imprecision, the information provided by the referring court, relating to the factual and regulatory framework, makes it possible to assess the scope of that question and to provide that court with an answer which is likely to prove useful to it, as is confirmed, moreover, by the written observations lodged by the Latvian and Estonian Governments and by the Commission.