larimo/cjeu-paragraph-retrieval huggingface dataset:
Staatssecretaris van Financiën v Pactor Vastgoed BV.
Date: 2013-10-10
30. In that regard, it should be noted that the Sixth Directive contains no express indication concerning the taxable person liable for tax debts resulting from the adjustment of a VAT deduction.
31. However, it cannot be inferred from this that the Member States are, in the context of the details or procedures which they are to determine under the second subparagraph of Article 13C and Article 20(1) of that directive, free to decide which taxpayer must pay the VAT in such a context.
32. Indeed, the designation of the person liable for the amounts due following the adjustment of a VAT deduction does not constitute a ‘detail’ or ‘procedure’ within the meaning of those provisions, but rather, as is apparent from Article 21 of that directive, a substantive rule of the common VAT system established by that directive.
33. In that regard, it should be pointed out that the adjustment mechanism provided for in the Sixth Directive is an integral part of the VAT deduction scheme established by that directive (see Case C‑234/11 TETS Haskovo  [2012] ECR I‑0000, paragraph 30, and Case C‑257/11 Gran Via Moineşti  [2012] ECR I‑0000, paragraph 39).
34. According to the case-law of the Court of Justice, the rules laid down by that directive in respect of adjustment of deductions are intended to enhance the precision of deductions so as to ensure the neutrality of VAT, with the result that transactions effected at an earlier stage continue to give rise to the right to deduct only to the extent that they are used to make supplies themselves subject to VAT. By those rules, that directive thus aims to establish a close and direct relationship between the right to deduct input VAT and the use of the goods and services concerned for taxable output transactions (see Case C‑63/04 Centralan Property  [2005] ECR I‑11087, paragraph 57; TETS Haskovo , paragraph 31, and Gran Via Moineşti , paragraph 38).
36. That provision must be interpreted as meaning that, in the event of adjustment of a VAT deduction applied by a taxable person, the amounts due in that regard must be paid by that taxable person.
37. A contrary interpretation, according to which the adjustment of a VAT deduction relating to a supply of goods or of services could be imposed on a taxable person other than the person who benefited from that supply or that service, would be incompatible with the objectives, recalled in paragraph 34 of the present judgment, pursued in that regard by the Sixth Directive.
Sumitomo Chemical Co. Ltd v Deutsches Patent- und Markenamt.
Date: 2013-10-17
34. Article 3(1)(b) of Regulation No 1610/96 refers to a MA granted ‘in accordance with Article 4 of Directive 91/414’. It is true that, it has been held that there is no need to interpret that provision of that regulation in a manner which would have the effect of excluding from the application of that provision products which have been granted a provisional MA under Article 8(1) of Directive 91/414 ( Hogan Lovells International , paragraph 46).
35. However, that interpretation rests on the link of functional equivalence which exists between the criteria set out in Article 8(1) of Directive 91/414 as transitional measures and those laid down in Article 4 of that directive ( Hogan Lovells International , paragraphs 33 to 46). There is no such link of functional equivalence between the criteria laid down in Article 8(4) of Directive 91/414 and those in Article 4 thereof.
41. In order to answer that question, it must be recalled that the supplementary protection certificate is designed to re-establish a sufficient period of effective protection of the patent by permitting the holder to enjoy an additional period of exclusivity on the expiry of the basic patent which is intended to compensate, at least in part, for the delay to the commercial exploitation of his invention by reason of the time which has elapsed between the date on which the application for the patent was lodged and the date on which the first MA in the European Union was granted ( Hogan Lovells International , paragraph 50).
42. In accordance with that purpose, the supplementary certificate establishes a link between the basic patent and the first MA granted for the plant protection product, with that MA marking the moment at which commercial exploitation of the product can begin. Thus, the grant of that certificate requires that the four cumulative conditions set out in Article 3(1) of Regulation No 1610/96 be met. That provision provides, essentially, that a supplementary protection certificate may be granted only if, at the date of the application, the plant protection product is protected by a basic patent in force and has not already been the subject of a certificate. In addition, the product must have been granted a valid MA ‘in accordance with Article 4 of Directive 91/414/EEC or an equivalent provision of national law’ and, finally, that MA must be the first authorisation of the product as a plant protection product ( Hogan Lovells International , paragraph 51).
Lokman Emrek v Vlado Sabranovic.
Date: 2013-10-17
23. The Court has already held that the essential condition to which the application of Article 15(1)(c) of Regulation No 44/2001 is subject is that relating to a commercial or professional activity directed to the State of the consumer’s domicile ( Mühlleitner , paragraph 44) and, in the present case, the referring court considers that that condition is satisfied.
31. In any event, it is for the referring court to make an overall assessment of the circumstances in which the consumer contract at issue in the main proceedings was concluded in order to decide whether or not, depending on the existence or absence of evidence mentioned on the non-exhaustive list as established by the Court in the relevant case-law mentioned in paragraphs 27 and 28 of this judgment, Article 15(1)(c) is applicable.
Isdin SA v Bial-Portela & Cª SA.
Date: 2013-10-17
21. Furthermore, according to settled case-law of the Court, the duty incumbent upon the General Court under Article 36 and the first paragraph of Article 53 of the Statute of the Court of Justice of the European Union to state reasons for its judgments does not require the General Court to provide an account that follows exhaustively and one by one all the arguments articulated by the parties to the case. The reasoning may therefore be implicit, on condition that it enables the persons concerned to know the grounds on which the General Court has based itself and provides the Court of Justice with sufficient material for it to exercise its powers of review on appeal (see, inter alia, judgment of 21 December 2011 in Case C‑320/09 P A2A v Commission , paragraph 97).
26. The Court has, it is true, acknowledged that, where the same ground of refusal is given for a category or group of goods or services, the reasoning may be general for all of the goods or services concerned (see, to that effect, BVBA Management, Training en Consultancy , paragraph 37, and order of 21 March 2012 in Case C‑87/11 P Fidelio v OHIM , paragraph 43).
27. However, such a power extends only to goods and services which are interlinked in a sufficiently direct and specific way, to the point where they form a sufficiently homogeneous category or group of goods or services. The mere fact that the goods or services concerned are within the same class of the Nice Agreement is not sufficient for a finding that such homogeneity exists, as those classes often contain a large variety of goods and services which are not necessarily interlinked in a sufficiently direct and specific way (see, to that effect, order in Case C‑282/09 P CFCMCEE v OHIM  [2010] ECR I‑2395, paragraph 40).
30. Accordingly, and without it being necessary to examine the other grounds relied on by Isdin in support of its appeal, the appeal must be allowed and the judgment under appeal set aside.
LBI hf v Kepler Capital Markets SA and Frédéric Giraux.
Date: 2013-10-24
22. At the outset, it must be borne in mind that, as is apparent from recital 6 in its preamble, Directive 2001/24 seeks to establish mutual recognition by the Member States of the measures taken by each of them to restore to viability the credit institutions which it has authorised. That objective, and that of guaranteeing equal treatment of creditors, laid down in recital 16 to that directive, require that the reorganisation and winding-up measures taken by the authorities of the home Member State have, in all the other Member States, the effects which the law of the home Member State confers on them.
39. As regards the question whether the transitional provisions of Law No 44/2009 must be able to form the subject of an action in order to constitute measures taken by an administrative or judicial authority for the purposes of Articles 3 and 9 of Directive 2001/24, it must be borne in mind that that directive, as is apparent from recital 6 thereto, establishes a system of mutual recognition of national reorganisation and winding-up measures, without seeking to harmonise national legislation on that subject.
45. According to the Court’s settled case-law, questions on the interpretation of EU law referred by a national court in the factual and legislative context which that court is responsible for defining, and the accuracy of which is not a matter for the Court to determine, enjoy a presumption of relevance. The Court may refuse to rule on a question referred by a national court only where it is quite obvious that the interpretation of EU law that is sought bears no relation to the actual facts of the main action or its purpose, where the problem is hypothetical, or where the Court does not have before it the factual or legal material necessary to give a useful answer to the questions submitted to it (see Case C‑152/11 Odar  [2012] ECR I‑0000, paragraph 24).
46. That presumption of relevance cannot be rebutted by the simple fact that one of the parties to the main proceedings contests certain facts, the accuracy of which is not a matter for the Court to determine and on which the delimitation of the subject-matter of those proceedings depends (see Case C‑379/05 Amurta  [2007] ECR I‑9569, paragraph 65 and case-law cited).
Sandler AG v Hauptzollamt Regensburg.
Date: 2013-10-24
49. It is settled case-law that the system of administrative cooperation established by a protocol stating, in an annex to an agreement between the European Union and a non-member State, the rules concerning the origin of goods is based on mutual trust between the authorities of the importing Member States and those of the exporting State and that the cooperation established by a protocol with regard to the origin of goods can function only if the importing State accepts the determinations legally made in that regard by the exporting State (see Case C‑409/10 Afasia Knits Deutschland [2011] ECR I‑0000, paragraphs 28 and 29 and the case-law cited).
Rivella International AG v Office for Harmonisation in the Internal Market (Trade Marks and Designs) (OHIM).
Date: 2013-12-12
48. As a preliminary point, it should be borne in mind that the Community trade mark system is an autonomous system with its own set of objectives and rules peculiar to it; it applies independently of any national system (see Case C‑190/10 Génesis  [2012] ECR I‑0000, paragraph 36, and Case C‑320/12 Malaysia Dairy Industries  [2013] ECR I‑0000, paragraph 33).
49. In that context, Rivella International cannot call in question the conclusions drawn by the General Court from the judgment of the Court of Justice in Case C‑234/06 P Il Ponte Finanziaria v OHIM [2007] ECR I‑7333 regarding the concept of use of a trade m ark. In that judgment, as the General Court recalled in paragraph 34 of the judgment under appeal, the Court held that the national concept of a defensive trade mark, pursuant to which an earlier trade mark is protected on the basis of national law even if its use cannot be established, cannot be used to oppose the registration of a Community trade mark.
European Commission v Portuguese Republic.
Date: 2014-01-15
39. Unlike the procedure established under Article 258 TFEU, which is designed to obtain a declaration that the conduct of a Member State is in breach of European Union law and to terminate that conduct (see Joined Cases 15/76 and 16/76 France  v Commission  [1979] ECR 321, paragraph 27, and Case C‑456/05 Commission  v Germany  [2007] ECR I‑10517, paragraph 25), the procedure provided for under Article 260 TFEU has a much narrower ambit, since it is designed only to induce a defaulting Member State to comply with a judgment establishing a breach of obligations (Case C‑304/02 Commission  v France  [2005] ECR I‑6263, paragraph 80, and Joined Cases C‑514/07 P, C‑528/07 P and C‑532/07 P Sweden  v API and Commission  [2010] ECR I‑8533, paragraph 119).
40. Consequently, that latter procedure must be regarded as a special judicial procedure for the enforcement of judgments and, in other words, as a method of enforcement (Case C‑304/02 Commission  v France , paragraph 92). Therefore, only a failure of a Member State to fulfil its obligations under the FEU Treaty which the Court has held, on the basis of Article 258 TFEU, to be well founded may be dealt with under that procedure (Case C‑457/07 Commission  v Portugal  [2009] ECR I‑8091, paragraph 47).
49. According to the system established by Articles 258 TFEU to 260 TFEU, the rights and duties of Member States may be determined and their conduct appraised only by a judgment of the Court of Justice (Case C‑191/95 Commission  v Germany  [1998] ECR I‑5449, paragraph 45 and the case-law cited).
56. In accordance with Articles 258 TFEU to 260 TFEU, Member States which, in the view of the Commission, have not fulfilled their obligations under European Union law are entitled, inter alia, to set out their position at a pre-litigation stage. The purpose of that stage of the procedure is to give the Member State concerned the opportunity to comply with its obligations or to present its case properly against the complaints set out by the Commission as regards its continued failure to fulfil its obligations (see, to that effect, inter alia, Case C‑457/07 Commission v Portugal , paragraph 67 and the case-law cited).
72. According to the Court’s settled case-law, the statement of the reasons on which a judgment is based must clearly and unequivocally disclose the General Court’s thinking, so that the persons concerned can be apprised of the justification for the decision taken and the Court of Justice can exercise its power of review (see, inter alia, Case C‑202/07 P France Télécom  v Commission [2009] ECR I‑2369, paragraph 29 and the case-law cited).
Constructora Principado SA v José Ignacio Menéndez Álvarez.
Date: 2014-01-16
18. As a preliminary point, it must be stated that, as is clear from Article 3(1) of the Directive, only the terms of a contract concluded between a seller or supplier and a consumer which have not been individually negotiated fall within the scope of the Directive.
20. In addition to that preliminary point, it must also be stated that, according to the Court’s settled case-law, the relevant jurisdiction of the Court extends to the interpretation of the concept of ‘unfair term’ used in Article 3(1) of the Directive and in the annex thereto, and to the criteria which the national court may or must apply when examining a contractual term in the light of the provisions of the Directive, bearing in mind that it is for that court to determine, in the light of those criteria, whether a particular contractual term is actually unfair in the circumstances of the case. It is thus clear that the Court must limit itself to providing the referring court with guidance which the latter must take into account in order to assess whether the term at issue is unfair (see Case C‑415/11 Aziz  [2013] ECR, paragraph 66 and the case-law cited).
21. In that regard, the Court has held that in order to ascertain whether a term causes a ‘significant imbalance’ in the parties’ rights and obligations under a contract to the detriment of the consumer, particular account must be taken of which rules of national law would apply in the absence of an agreement by the parties in that regard. Such a comparative analysis will enable the national court to evaluate whether and, as the case may be, to what extent, the contract places the consumer in a legal situation less favourable than that provided for by the national law in force (see Aziz , paragraph 68).
24. In that regard, the Court has confirmed that, pursuant to Article 4(1) of the Directive, the unfairness of a contractual term is to be assessed taking into account the nature of the goods or services for which the contract in question was concluded and by referring to all the circumstances attending its conclusion, as well as all the other clauses in the contract (see Case C‑472/11 Banif Plus Bank  [2013] ECR, paragraph 40). In that respect, it follows that the consequences of the term under the law applicable to the contract must also be taken into account, requiring consideration to be given to the national legal system (see Aziz , paragraph 71).
25. The Court has also stated, in the context of Article 5 of the Directive, that before the contract is concluded the information relating to the contractual terms and the consequences of concluding the contract is of fundamental importance to the consumer. It is, in particular, on the basis of that information that the consumer decides whether he wishes to be bound by the conditions drafted in advance by the seller or supplier (see Case C‑92/11 RWE Vertrieb  [2013] ECR, paragraph 44).
Finanzamt Düsseldorf-Mitte v Ibero Tours GmbH.
Date: 2014-01-16
25. Of course, the aim of Article 26 of the Sixth Directive is to avoid the practical difficulties arising from the fact that the activities of travel agents and tour operators consist of multiple services and are performed in several locations. However, the attainment of that objective in no way requires any derogation from the rule laid down in Article 11A(1)(a) of the Sixth Directive which, for the purposes of determining the taxable amount, refers to ‘the consideration which has been or is to be obtained by the supplier from the ... customer or a third party’ (see the judgment in Case C-149/01 First Choice Holidays  [2003] ECR I-6289, paragraph 26).
29. It should be recalled in that regard that the Court held in that judgment that when a manufacturer of a product who, having no contractual relationship with the final consumer but being the first link in a chain of transactions which ends with that final consumer, grants the final consumer a price reduction using discount coupons received by retailers and reimbursed by the manufacturer to those retailers, the taxable amount for VAT purposes must be reduced by that reduction ( Elida Gibbs , paragraphs 31, 34 and 35). In the case which gave rise to the judgment in Elida Gibbs , the consideration received by the taxpayer, who was at the head of a chain of operations, was, in fact, actually reduced by the reduction granted by that taxpayer directly to the final consumer.
33. It follows from the foregoing that the answer to the first question is that the provisions of the Sixth Directive must be interpreted as meaning that the principles laid down by the Court of Justice in Elida Gibbs  concerning the determination of the taxable amount of the VAT do not apply when a travel agent, acting as an intermediary, grants to the final consumer, on the travel agent’s own initiative and at his own expense, a price reduction on the principal service provided by the tour operator.
The second and third questions
Ralph Schmid v Lilly Hertel.
Date: 2014-01-16
28. The Court has already held that, in order to determine which court has jurisdiction to open insolvency proceedings, the centre of the debtor’s main interests must be determined at the time when the request to open insolvency proceedings has been lodged (see Case C-1/04 Staubitz‑Schreiber  [2006] ECR I‑701, paragraph 29). As the Advocate General has observed in point 29 of her Opinion, at that early stage, the existence of any cross-border element may be unknown. However, determination of the court which has jurisdiction cannot be postponed until such time as the locations of various aspects of the proceedings in addition to the centre of the debtor’s main interests, such as the residence of a potential defendant to an ancillary action, are known. To wait for knowledge of these matters would frustrate the objectives of improving the efficiency and effectiveness of insolvency proceedings having cross-border effects.
30. That being so, as regards the specific point as to whether the courts of the Member State within the territory of which insolvency proceedings have been opened have jurisdiction to hear and determine an action to set a transaction aside by virtue of insolvency that is brought against a person whose place of residence is not within the territory of a Member State, it should be recalled that the Court held in Seagon , paragraph 21, that Article 3(1) of the Regulation must be interpreted as meaning that it also confers on the courts of the Member State which has jurisdiction to open insolvency proceedings international jurisdiction to hear and determine actions which derive directly from those proceedings and which are closely connected with them.
39. In the light of all of the foregoing, the answer to the question referred is that Article 3(1) of the Regulation must be interpreted as meaning that the courts of the Member State within the territory of which insolvency proceedings have been opened have jurisdiction to hear and determine an action to set a transaction aside by virtue of insolvency that is brought against a person whose place of residence is not within the territory of a Member State.
Costs
Mattia Manzi and Compagnia Naviera Orchestra v Capitaneria di Porto di Genova.
Date: 2014-01-23
37. It must be held at the outset that the validity of Article 4a(4) of Directive 1999/32 cannot be determined in the light of Annex VI since the European Union is not a contracting party to the Marpol 73/78 Convention, including Annex VI, and is not bound by it (see, by analogy, Case C‑308/06 Intertanko and Others  [2008] ECR I‑4057, paragraphs 47 and 52).
38. Nor can the validity of Article 4a(4) be examined in the light of the general principle of international law pacta sunt servanda , since that principle applies only to those subject to international law who are contracting parties to a specific international agreement and which, as a result, are bound by it.
39. Furthermore, it does not appear that Annex VI constitutes an expression of the customary rules enshrined by general international law which, are binding upon the institutions of the Union and form part of the legal order of the Union (see, to that effect, Case C‑386/08 Brita  [2010] ECR I‑1289, paragraph 42).
40. Finally, it must be stated that the principles laid down in paragraphs 47 to 52 of Intertanko and Others , according to which the validity of Directive 1999/32 cannot be examined in the light of Annex VI may not be circumvented by relying on the alleged infringement of the principle of cooperation in good faith laid down in the first subparagraph of Article 4(3) TEU.
48. It is clear from the case-law of the Court that the latter is required to observe that principle since it constitutes a customary rule of international law which, as such, is binding upon the European Union institutions and forms part of its legal order (see, to that effect, Brita , paragraphs 42 to 44).