larimo/cjeu-paragraph-retrieval huggingface dataset:
Commission of the European Communities v Kingdom of the Netherlands.
Date: 2001-05-10
16 The Netherlands Government disputes that finding, contending that the third paragraph of Article 189 of the Treaty leaves the Member States entirely free to choose the form and methods necessary to transpose a directive into national law. Relying inter alia on the judgment in Case 29/84 Commission v Germany [1985] ECR 1661 (paragraph 23), it contends that specific implementing measures are not indispensable if the national legal system already secures the aims pursued by the directive.
17 It should be borne in mind, in that connection, that, according to settled case-law, whilst legislative action on the part of each Member State is not necessarily required in order to implement a directive, it is essential for national law to guarantee that the national authorities will effectively apply the directive in full, that the legal position under national law should be sufficiently precise and clear and that individuals are made fully aware of their rights and, where appropriate, may rely on them before the national courts (Case C-365/93 Commission v Greece [1995] ECR I-499, paragraph 9).
18 As the Court has already made clear, the last-mentioned condition is of particular importance where the directive in question is intended to accord rights to nationals of other Member States (Case C-365/93, cited above, paragraph 9). That is the position in the present case, it being one of the aims of the Directive, according to the sixth recital in its preamble, to safeguard the citizen in his role as consumer when acquiring goods and services under contracts which are governed by the laws of Member States other than his own.
21 As regards the argument advanced by the Netherlands Government that, if the Netherlands legislation were interpreted in such a way as to ensure conformity with the Directive - a principle endorsed by the Hoge Raad der Nederlanden (Netherlands) - it would be possible in any event to remedy any disparity between the provisions of Netherlands legislation and those of the Directive, suffice it to note that, as the Advocate General explained in point 36 of his Opinion, even where the settled case-law of a Member State interprets the provisions of national law in a manner deemed to satisfy the requirements of a directive, that cannot achieve the clarity and precision needed to meet the requirement of legal certainty. That, moreover, is particularly true in the field of consumer protection.
VauDe Sport GmbH & Co. KG v Oberfinanzdirektion Koblenz.
Date: 2001-05-10
12 It is appropriate to recall at the outset the settled case-law of the Court according to which, in the interests of legal certainty and for ease of verification, the decisive criterion for the classification of goods for customs purposes is in general to be sought in their objective characteristics and properties as defined in the wording of the relevant heading of the CN (see, inter alia, Case C-42/99 Eru Portuguesa [2000] ECR I-7691, paragraph 13).
13 Furthermore, the explanatory notes drawn up, as regards the CN, by the Commission and, as regards the harmonised commodity description and coding system, by the Customs Cooperation Council (the explanatory notes), are an important aid to the interpretation of the scope of the various tariff headings but do not have legally binding force (see, inter alia, Case C-309/98 Holz Geenen [2000] ECR I-1975, paragraph 14).
21 Accordingly, given that there is no specific tariff heading under which the product may be classified, it is necessary, thirdly, to establish whether it may be classified under heading 6307 or 7616 by applying the general rules.
25 In this connection, it is settled case-law that, in order to identify, from among the materials of which a product is composed, which is the one that gives it its essential character, it is necessary to determine whether the product would retain its characteristic properties if one or other of its constituents were removed from it (see, to that effect, Case 253/87 Sportex [1988] ECR 3351, paragraph 8).
International Express Carriers Conference (IECC) v Commission of the European Communities, Deutsche Post AG, United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, The Post Office and La Poste.
Date: 2001-05-17
36 In that regard, it should be pointed out that the four arguments put forward by the IECC, with the exception of the part of the second argument relating to ABC remail operations, raise new matters which were not submitted at first instance. Under Article 113(2) of the Rules of Procedure, they are therefore inadmissible in this appeal.
54 In that regard, it should be pointed out that, when it rejects a complaint submitted to it under Article 3 of Regulation No 17, the Commission is required to set out the reasons for its decisions to reject it, and more particularly to state the reasons for its assessment of whether or not it was appropriate to examine the complaint any further, in a sufficiently precise and detailed manner to enable the Community judicature effectively to review the Commission's use of its discretion to define priorities (Case C-119/97 P Ufex and Others v Commission [1999] ECR I-1341, paragraph 91). On the other hand, it is under no obligation to include in its decision an express reference to the concept of Community interest.
57 In that regard, it should be observed that the Commission, in the exercise of its discretion, must take into consideration all the relevant matters of law and of fact in order to decide on what action to take in response to a complaint. More particularly, it must consider attentively all the matters of fact and of law which the complainant brings to its attention (Case 210/81 Demo-Studio Schmidt v Commission [1983] ECR 3045, paragraph 19, Case 298/83 CICCE v Commission [1985] ECR 1105, paragraph 18, Joined Cases 142/84 and 156/84 BAT and Reynolds v Commission [1987] ECR 4487, paragraph 20, and Ufex and Others v Commission, cited above, paragraph 86).
58 However, in view of the fact that the assessment of the Community interest raised by a complaint depends on the circumstances of each case, the number of criteria of assessment to which the Commission may refer should not be limited nor, conversely, should it be required to have recourse exclusively to certain criteria (Ufex and Others v Commission, paragraph 79).
Hewlett Packard BV v Directeur général des douanes et droits indirects.
Date: 2001-05-17
18 A classification regulation, such as Regulation No 2184/97, is adopted by the Commission on the advice of the Customs Code Committee when the classification in the CN of a particular product is such as to give rise to difficulty or to be a matter for dispute.
19 As the Advocate General observed at point 21 of his Opinion, a classification regulation is of general application in so far as it does not apply to an individual trader but, in general, to products which are the same as that examined by the Customs Code Committee.
20 In the interpretation of a classification regulation, in order to determine its scope, account must be taken inter alia of the reasons given, as the Court did in its judgment in Rank Xerox (Case C-67/95 [1997] ECR I-5401, paragraph 26).
Commission of the European Communities v Italian Republic.
Date: 2001-05-17
32 Concerning the argument of the Italian Government that, in reality, the prohibitions arising from the birds directive are complied with bearing in mind, first, the amendment of Article 18 of Law No 157/92 by the Decree of 21 March 1997 and, secondly, the circular of 13 May 1997, the following considerations from the case-law of the Court of Justice concerning the obligations upon Member States when they transpose Community directives must be borne in mind:
- the provisions of directives must be implemented with unquestionable binding force, and the specificity, precision and clarity necessary to satisfy the requirements of legal certainty (see, in particular, Case C-225/97 Commission v France [1999] ECR I-3011, paragraph 37); and
- mere administrative practices, which by their nature are alterable at will by the authorities and are not given the appropriate publicity, cannot be regarded as constituting the proper fulfilment of a Member State's obligations under the Treaty (see, in particular, Case C-315/98 Commission v Italy [1999] ECR I-8001, paragraph 10).
Commission of the European Communities v Italian Republic.
Date: 2001-05-29
12 In that connection, it should be pointed out, first, that it is settled case-law that the question whether a Member State has failed to fulfil its obligations must be determined by reference to the situation prevailing in the Member State at the end of the period laid down in the reasoned opinion and that the Court cannot take account of any subsequent changes (see, in particular, Case C-316/96 Commission v Italy [1997] ECR I-7231, paragraph 14).
15 Since no public-interest reason based on Article 56(1) of the EC Treaty (now, after amendment, Article 46(1) EC) and capable of justifying such discrimination has been put forward by the Italian Government, the complaint alleging infringement of Article 52 of the Treaty must therefore be held to be well founded.
Infringement of Article 59 of the Treaty
20 In order to determine whether the Commission's second complaint is well founded, it must be observed, first, that the condition that nationals of the other Member States wishing to pursue the activity of transport consultant in Italy must have their residence in that Member State directly negates the freedom to provide services in so far as it makes it impossible for persons established in other Member States to provide services in Italy (see, to that effect, Case C-355/98 Commission v Belgium [2000] ECR I-1221, paragraph 27).
21 Moreover, according to consistent case-law, national legislation which makes the provision of certain services on national territory by an undertaking established in another Member State subject to the issue of an administrative authorisation, failing which a fine is imposed, constitutes a restriction on the freedom to provide services within the meaning of Article 59 of the Treaty (see, in particular, Case C-355/98, cited above, paragraph 35). The same is true for the conditions to be met for obtaining such authorisation, such as the lodging of a security.
23 The freedom to provide services, being one of the fundamental principles of the Treaty, may be restricted only by rules justified by the public interest and applicable to all persons and undertakings operating in the territory of the Member State where the service is provided, in so far as that interest is not safeguarded by the rules to which the provider of such a service is subject in the Member State where he is established (Case C-355/98, cited above, paragraph 37).
27 In proceedings under Article 226 EC for failure to fulfil an obligation, it is incumbent upon the Commission to prove the allegation that the obligation has not been fulfilled and to place before the Court the information needed to enable it to determine whether the obligation has not been fulfilled (see, in particular, Case C-159/94 Commission v France [1997] ECR I-5815, paragraph 102).
D and Kingdom of Sweden v Council of the European Union.
Date: 2001-05-31
47 Secondly, as regards infringement of the principle of equal treatment of officials irrespective of their sexual orientation, it is clear that it is not the sex of the partner which determines whether the household allowance is granted, but the legal nature of the ties between the official and the partner.
48 The principle of equal treatment can apply only to persons in comparable situations, and so it is necessary to consider whether the situation of an official who has registered a partnership between persons of the same sex, such as the partnership entered into by D under Swedish law, is comparable to that of a married official.
Commission of the European Communities v Italian Republic.
Date: 2001-05-31
20 In that regard, it is apparent from the Court's case-law that the derogation in question must be restricted to activities which in themselves are directly and specifically connected with the exercise of official authority (see, in particular, paragraph 35 of the judgment in Commission v Spain and paragraph 25 of the judgment in Commission v Belgium, cited above). The Court has also held that the activities of undertakings providing caretaking and security services are not normally directly and specifically connected with the exercise of official authority (Commission v Belgium, paragraph 26; see also Commission v Spain, paragraph 39).
25 Next, it should be noted that, unlike the Treaty provisions relating to freedom of establishment and freedom to provide services, Articles 48 et seq. of the Treaty, concerning freedom of movement for workers, make no provision for any derogations in respect of activities connected with the exercise of official authority. Article 48(4) merely states that the provisions of that article are not to apply to employment in the public service. As the Advocate General observes in paragraph 26 of his Opinion, the concept of employment in the public service does not encompass employment by a private natural or legal person, whatever the duties of the employee. Thus, it is undeniable that sworn private security guards do not form part of the public service. Consequently, Article 48(4) of the Treaty is not applicable in the present case.
CBA Computer Handels- und Beteiligungs GmbH, formerly VOBIS Microcomputer AG v Hauptzollamt Aachen.
Date: 2001-06-07
13 By virtue of that amendment, that subheading of the Combined Nomenclature covers both sound cards as such and sound cards which form part of a kit.
The dispute in the main proceedings
21 As the Court has repeatedly held, the decisive criterion for the customs classification of goods must be sought generally in their objective characteristics and qualities, as defined in the relevant heading of the Common Customs Tariff and in the notes to the sections or chapters (see, in particular, Case C-11/93 Siemens Nixdorf [1994] ECR I-1945, paragraph 11).
27 Sounds and images are data, irrespective of the form they may take, and the processing of either constitutes data processing. For that reason, as well as for those set out by the Advocate General in points 31 to 39 of his Opinion, the sound cards at issue in the present case, like the graphics cards at issue in Techex, have no specific function within the meaning of Note 5(E) to Chapter 84 of the Combined Nomenclature, as worded at the material time for the main proceedings, and must therefore be classified under heading 8471.
31 On the other hand, Regulation No 2086/97 provides for the classification of sound cards as such. None the less, it is not disputed that that regulation entered into force after the material time for the main proceedings and that it was not given retroactive effect. Moreover, even if Regulation No 2086/97 was only intended to clarify the tariff classification of sound cards without amending its substance, as the Hauptzollamt claims, a regulation specifying the conditions for classification in a tariff heading or subheading is of a legislative nature and cannot have retroactive effect (see Case 158/78 Biegi [1979] ECR 1103, paragraph 11). Consequently, the issue of the validity of Regulation No 2086/97 is likewise not germane to the main proceedings.
Doris Salzmann.
Date: 2001-06-14
12 All three point out that the function which the Bezirksgericht performs, when acting as the tribunal responsible for keeping the land register, is of a similar nature to that which the Italian courts perform when they determine, in the course of a process of giurisdizione volontaria, an application for approval of a company's statutes for the purposes of its registration on the register, a function which the Court held lacked judicial character in Case C-111/94 Job Centre [1995] ECR I-3361, paragraphs 9 to 11.
13 In order to determine whether a referring body is a court or tribunal within the meaning of Article 177 of the Treaty, which is a question governed by Community law alone, the Court takes account of a number of factors, such as whether the body is established by law, whether it is permanent, whether its jurisdiction is compulsory, whether its procedure is inter partes, whether it applies rules of law and whether it is independent (see, in particular, Case C-54/96 Dorsch Consult [1997] ECR I-4961, paragraph 23, and the case-law cited therein, and in Joined Cases C-110/98 to C-147/98 Gabalfrisa and Others [2000] ECR I-1577, paragraph 33).
14 Furthermore, whilst Article 177 of the Treaty does not make the reference to the Court subject to there having been an inter partes hearing in the proceedings in the course of which the national court refers a question for a preliminary ruling (see Case C-18/93 Corsica Ferries [1994] ECR I-1783, paragraph 12), it follows, none the less, from that article that a national court may refer a question to the Court only if there is a case pending before it and if it is called upon to give judgment in proceedings intended to lead to a decision of a judicial nature (see Case 318/85 Greis Unterweger [1986] ECR 955, paragraph 4, and Case C-134/97 Victoria Film [1998] ECR I-7023, paragraph 14).
15 Thus, when it makes an administrative decision without being required to decide a legal dispute, the referring body, even if it satisfies the other conditions mentioned in paragraph 13 of this judgment, cannot be regarded as exercising a judicial function. Such is the case, for example, when it determines an application for registration of a company according to a procedure, the object of which is not the annulment of a measure adversely affecting the applicant (Job Centre, paragraph 11).
Commission of the European Communities v French Republic.
Date: 2001-06-14
19 The principle of the right to deduct VAT is none the less subject to the derogation in Article 17(6) of the Sixth Directive and, in particular, its second subparagraph. The Member States are thereby authorised to retain their existing legislation in regard to exclusion from the right of deduction until such time as the Council has adopted the provisions envisaged by that article (Case C-305/97 Royscot and Others [1999] ECR I-6671, paragraph 29).
20 However, since none of the proposals put to the Council by the Commission under the first subparagraph of Article 17(6) of the Sixth Directive was adopted by the Council, it should be pointed out that the Member States may retain their existing legislation in regard to exclusion from the right to deduct VAT until such time as the Community legislature has established a Community system of exclusions and brought about the progressive harmonisation of national VAT legislation (Royscot and Others, cited above, paragraph 31).
21 In order to assess whether the amendment of the national legislation at issue is compatible with the provisions of the Sixth Directive, reference should be made to the judgment in Case C-136/97 Norbury Developments [1999] ECR I-2491, which concerned another transitional provision of the Sixth Directive, namely Article 28(3)(b) concerning VAT exemptions. In that judgment, the Court held that amendments made to the legislation of a Member State which did not increase the scope of VAT exemption but, rather, reduced it, did not breach the terms of that article. Whilst that article precludes the introduction of further exemptions or an increase in the scope of exemptions existing before the entry into force of the Sixth Directive, it does not prevent their reduction, since their abolition is the objective of Article 28(4) of the Sixth Directive (see Norbury Developments, cited above, paragraph 19).
22 The same reasoning can be applied in the interpretation of Article 17(6) of the Sixth Directive. Thus, where the legislation of a Member State, after the entry into force of the Sixth Directive, is amended so as to reduce the scope of existing exemptions and thereby brings itself into line with the objective of the Sixth Directive, that legislation must be considered to be covered by the derogation provided for by the second subparagraph of Article 17(6) of the Sixth Directive and is not in breach of Article 17(2).
Commission of the European Communities v Republic of Austria.
Date: 2001-06-14
12 In answer to the arguments of the Republic of Austria, it must be pointed out that, in accordance with the settled case-law of the Court, a Member State may not invoke provisions, practices or circumstances existing in its internal legal order, including those resulting from its federal organisation, to justify a failure to comply with the obligations and time-limits laid down in a directive (see, in particular, Case C-298/95 Commission v Germany [1996] ECR I-6747, paragraph 18, and Case C-236/99 Commission v Belgium [2000] ECR I-5657, paragraph 23).
13 Moreover, the Court has repeatedly held that the question whether a Member State has failed to fulfil its obligations must be determined by reference to the situation in the Member State as it stood at the end of the period laid down in the reasoned opinion, and that the Court may not take account of any subsequent changes (see, inter alia, Case C-266/99 Commission v France [2001] ECR I-1781, paragraph 38).
Commission of the European Communities v French Republic.
Date: 2001-06-14
5 From 1 January 1979, the date of entry into force of the Sixth Directive, until 30 June 1982, diesel used as fuel for the operation of vehicles and machines on the purchase of which no VAT was deductible was excluded from the right to deduct VAT.
9 On 30 October 1998 the French authorities replied to that letter of formal notice stating that they did not share the Commission's point of view. The French authorities essentially argued that they were free to make changes to the right to deduction provided they did not extend the limitation that existed on the date of entry into force of the Sixth Directive in France, that is to say on 1 January 1979.
16 According to the judgment delivered today in Case C-345/99 Commission v France [2001] ECR I-4493, paragraph 22, where, after the entry into force of the Sixth Directive, the legislation of a Member State is amended so as to reduce the scope of existing exemptions and thereby brings itself into line with the objective of the Sixth Directive, that legislation is covered by the derogation provided for by the second subparagraph of Article 17(6) of the Sixth Directive and is not in breach of Article 17(2).
17 On the other hand, national legislation does not constitute a derogation permitted by the second subparagraph of Article 17(6) of the Sixth Directive if its effect is to inrease, after the entry into force of the Sixth Directive, the extent of existing exclusions, thus diverging from the objective of that directive.
18 The same is true of any amendment subsequent to the entry into force of the Sixth Directive which increases the extent of exclusions applicable immediately before that amendment.
19 It is common ground that the French law at issue, in excluding altogether a right to deduct VAT, amends the French legislation in such a way as to diverge from the objective of the Sixth Directive. It is of little importance that the amendment does not extend the scope of the exclusions that applied when the directive came into force.
23 However, according to settled case-law, it is for the Commission to judge at what time it will bring an action for failure to fulfil obligations (see inter alia Case C-317/92 Commission v Germany [1994] ECR I-2039, paragraph 4).