Plato Plastik Robert Frank GmbH v Caropack Handelsgesellschaft mbH.
Date: 2004-04-29
26. It has consistently been held that 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. Consequently, where the questions submitted by the national court concern the interpretation of Community law, the Court of Justice is, in principle, bound to give a ruling (see in particular Case C-415/93 Bosman  [1995] ECR I-4921, paragraph 59; Case C‑379/98 PreussenElektra  [2001] ECR I-2099, paragraph 38; Case C-153/00 Der Weduwe  [2002] ECR I-11319, paragraph 31; and Case C‑318/00 Bacardi-Martini and Cellier des Dauphins  [2003] ECR I-905, paragraph 40).
27. However, the Court has also held that, in exceptional circumstances, it should examine the conditions in which the case was referred to it by the national court (see, to that effect, PreussenElektra , paragraph 39). The spirit of cooperation which must prevail in the preliminary ruling procedure requires the national court, for its part, to have regard to the function entrusted to the Court of Justice, which is to assist in the administration of justice in the Member States and not to deliver advisory opinions on general or hypothetical questions (see Bosman , paragraph 60, Der Weduwe , paragraph 32, and Bacardi-Martini and Cellier des Dauphins , paragraph 41).
28. The Court has accordingly held that it has no jurisdiction to give a preliminary ruling on a question submitted by a national court where it is quite obvious that the interpretation or assessment of the validity of a Community rule sought by that court bears no relation to the facts or purpose of the main action, where the problem is hypothetical or where the Court does not have before it the factual or legal material necessary to enable it to give a useful answer to the questions submitted to it (see Bosman , cited above, paragraph 61; Case C-437/97 EKW and Wein & Co  [2000] ECR I-1157, paragraph 52, and Case C-36/99 Idéal tourisme  [2000] ECR I‑6049, paragraph 20).
29. In order that the Court of Justice may perform its task in accordance with the EC Treaty it is essential for national courts to explain, when the reasons do not emerge beyond any doubt from the file, why they consider that a reply to their questions is necessary to enable them to give judgment (Case 244/80 Foglia  [1981] ECR 3045, paragraph 17). Thus the Court has also on various occasions stressed that it is important for the national court to state the precise reasons for which it is in doubt as to the interpretation of Community law and which led it to consider it necessary to refer questions to the Court for a preliminary ruling (see inter alia the orders in Case C-101/96 Italia Testa  [1996] ECR I-3081, paragraph 6, Joined Cases C-128/97 and C-137/97 Testa and Modesti  [1998] ECR I-2181, paragraph 15, and Case C-116/00 Laguillaumie  [2000] ECR I-4979, paragraph 16).
47. It must be observed that, under Article 3(1) of Directive 94/62, any product which meets two conditions must be deemed to be packaging.
49. As the Advocate General correctly observes at paragraph 41 of his Opinion, the possible functions of packaging are not listed in the first subparagraph of Article 3(1) of Directive 94/62 in such a way as to mean that they are cumulative. This interpretation is confirmed, as appears from paragraphs 54 to 58 of this judgment, by the purpose of Directive 94/62.
56. According to the fifth recital in the preamble to the directive and Article 2 thereof, Directive 94/62 is intended to cover all packaging placed on the market in the Community.
57. The exclusion of plastic carrier bags from the definition of packaging would run counter to a broad interpretation of that term. Furthermore, such a limitation would be likely to impede the attainment of the aims of Directive 94/62. It can hardly be disputed that, as the Advocate General rightly points out in paragraph 68 of his Opinion, the widespread use of plastic bags in everyday life gives rise to a major environmental problem because of the high number of plastic bags in circulation and because they have a long life.
64. The Court has consistently held that the different language versions of a Community text must be given a uniform interpretation and hence in the case of divergence between the versions the provision in question must be interpreted by reference to the purpose and general scheme of the rules of which it forms part (Case 30/77 Bouchereau  [1977] ECR 1999, paragraph 14; Case C-449/93 Rockfon  [1995] ECR I-4291, paragraph 28; Case C-236/97 Codan  [1998] ECR I-8679, paragraph 28, and Case C-127/00 Hässle [2003] ECR I-0000, paragraph 70).