larimo/cjeu-paragraph-retrieval huggingface dataset:
Odette Simon v Commission of the European Communities.
Date: 2002-06-27
39 To allow a party to put forward for the first time before the Court of Justice a plea in law which it has not raised before the Court of First Instance would be to allow it to bring before the Court, whose jurisdiction in appeals is limited, a case of wider ambit than that which came before the Court of First Instance. In an appeal the Court's jurisdiction is confined to review of the findings of law on the pleas argued before the Court of First Instance (see Case C-136/92 P Commission v Brazzelli Lualdi and Others [1994] ECR I-1981, paragraph 59, and the order in Case C-422/97 P Sateba v Commission [1998] ECR I-4913, paragraph 30).
46 By contrast, the Court of First Instance has exclusive jurisdiction to find the facts, save where a substantive inaccuracy in its findings is attributable to the documents submitted to it, and to appraise those facts. That appraisal thus does not, save where the clear sense of the evidence has been distorted, constitute a point of law which is subject, as such, to review by the Court of Justice in appeal proceedings (see, in particular, Case C-390/95 P Antillean Rice Mills and Others v Commission [1999] ECR I-769, paragraph 29, and Joined Cases C-486/01 P-R and C-488/01 P-R Front national and Martinez v Parliament [2002] ECR I-0000, paragraphs 83 to 85).
Andreas Hoves Internationaler Transport-Service SARL v Finanzamt Borken.
Date: 2002-07-02
58 In any event, Article 8(1) of Regulation No 3118/93 provides that Member States are to assist one another in applying that regulation. If the German authorities had doubts as to the lawfulness of cabotage authorisations issued by the Luxembourg authorities, it was their responsibility to refer that question to those authorities so that, if need be, the latter could re-examine the situation. In their capacity as authorities of the host Member State, the German authorities were, however, not entitled to decline to recognise cabotage authorisations issued by the Member State of establishment or to impose a condition for carrying out cabotage by road not laid down by Regulation No 3118/93 (see, to that effect, Case C-202/97 FTS v Bestuur van het Landelijk Instituut Sociale Verzekeringen [2000] ECR I-883, paragraphs 51 to 56, and Case C-178/97 Banks and Others v Théâtre Royal de la Monnaie [2000] ECR I-2005, paragraphs 38 to 43).
Commission of the European Communities v Hellenic Republic.
Date: 2002-07-04
7 It must be borne in mind that, according to settled case-law, 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-69/99 Commission v United Kingdom [2000] ECR I-10979, paragraph 22; Case C-147/00 Commission v France [2001] ECR I-2387, paragraph 26, and Case C-110/00 Commission v Austria [2001] ECR I-7545, paragraph 13).
Flightline Ltd v Secretário de Estado dos Transportes e Comunicações and Transportes Aéreos Portugueses SA (TAP).
Date: 2002-07-09
20 In that regard it must first of all be observed that whilst the Court does not have jurisdiction under Article 234 EC to apply the rules of Community law to a particular case or to judge the compatibility of provisions of national law with those rules, it may provide a national court with all the elements relating to the interpretation of Community law which may be useful to it in assessing the effects of the provisions of that law (see the judgment in Case 128/88 Di Felice [1989] ECR 923, paragraph 7).
21 Secondly, in the context of the system of cooperation between the Court of Justice and the national courts provided for by Article 234 EC, 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, inter alia, Case C-415/93 Bosman [1995] ECR I-4921, paragraph 59).
Town & County Factors Ltd v Commissioners of Customs & Excise.
Date: 2002-09-17
18 It should also be noted that in paragraph 14 of Tolsma the Court held that a supply of services is effected `for consideration' within the meaning of Article 2(1) of the Sixth Directive, and hence is taxable, only if there is a legal relationship between the provider of the service and the recipient pursuant to which there is reciprocal performance, the remuneration received by the provider of the service constituting the value actually given in return for the service supplied to the recipient.
27 It should be noted, second, that it is settled case-law that that rule must be interpreted as meaning that the taxable amount for a supply of services is represented by the consideration actually received for that supply (see, inter alia, Case C-126/88 Boots Company [1990] ECR I-1235, paragraph 19, and Case C-258/95 Fillibeck [1997] ECR I-5577, paragraph 13).
29 It should be observed, finally, that that interpretation of Article 11A(1)(a) of the Sixth Directive does not call into question the Court's interpretation in Glawe, inasmuch as the operation of the gaming machines concerned by that judgment and the organisation of the competition at issue in the main proceedings differ in essential points.
30 While those gaming machines were characterised by the fact that, in accordance with mandatory statutory provisions, they were set in such a way that at least a certain percentage, in fact 60%, of the players' stakes was paid out to them as winnings and those stakes were kept technically and physically separate from the stakes which the operator could actually take for himself, the competition at issue in the main proceedings does not display any of those features, so that the organiser of the competition has freely at his disposal the full amount of the entry fees received.
Antonio Muñoz y Cia SA and Superior Fruiticola SA v Frumar Ltd and Redbridge Produce Marketing Ltd.
Date: 2002-09-17
27 Pursuant to the second subparagraph of Article 189 of the EC Treaty (now the second subparagraph of Article 249 EC) regulations have general application and are directly applicable in all Member States. Accordingly, owing to their very nature and their place in the system of sources of Community law, regulations operate to confer rights on individuals which the national courts have a duty to protect (see, inter alia, Case 34/73 Fratelli Variola [1973] ECR 981, paragraph 8).
28 The national courts, whose task it is to apply the provisions of Community law in areas within their jurisdiction, must ensure that they take full effect (see, inter alia, Case 106/77 Simmenthal [1978] ECR 629, paragraph 16, Case C-213/89 Factortame and Others [1990] ECR I-2433, paragraph 19, and Case C-453/99 Courage and Crehan [2001] ECR I-6297, paragraph 25).
A. G. Lawrence and Others v Regent Office Care Ltd, Commercial Catering Group and Mitie Secure Services Ltd.
Date: 2002-09-17
4 During the tendering period, female employees brought an action against the Council for equal pay without discrimination based on sex, pursuant to the Equal Pay Act 1970 (`the 1970 Act').  The applicants in those proceedings were ultimately successful after the House of Lords found in their favour in a decision of 6 July 1995 ([1995] ICR 833).  The Council had accepted the results of a national job evaluation study dating from 1987, which rated the work of the female applicants in those proceedings as being of equal value to that of men performing jobs such as gardening, refuse collection and sewage treatment.  The House of Lords rejected the argument that the Council was entitled to pay female workers less to enable it to compete with a commercial company in the competitive tendering process on the open market.  It also rejected the argument that the difference in pay in question was genuinely due to a material factor other than the difference in sex.  In short, the House of Lords ruled that the applicants in those proceedings were entitled, for the purposes of securing equal pay without discrimination based on sex, to compare themselves with men who were employed by the Council in other service areas and who, as the job evaluation study had recognised, performed work of equal value.
11 In order to reply to the first question, it should be noted at the outset that Article 141(1) EC lays down the principle that equal work or work of equal value must be remunerated in the same way, whether it is performed by a man or a woman.
12 As the Court held in Case 43/75 Defrenne II [1976] ECR 455, paragraph 12, that principle, which is a particular expression of the general principle of equality which prohibits comparable situations from being treated differently unless the difference is objectively justified, forms part of the foundations of the Community (see Case C-381/99 Brunnhofer [2001] ECR I-4961, paragraph 28).
17 There is, in this connection, nothing in the wording of Article 141(1) EC to suggest that the applicability of that provision is limited to situations in which men and women work for the same employer.  The Court has held that the principle established by that article may be invoked before national courts, in particular in cases of discrimination arising directly from legislative provisions or collective labour agreements, as well as in cases in which work is carried out in the same establishment or service, whether private or public (see, inter alia, Defrenne II, paragraph 40; Case 129/79 Macarthys [1980] ECR 1275, paragraph 10; and Case 96/80 Jenkins [1981] ECR 911, paragraph 17).
Fonderie Officine Meccaniche Tacconi SpA v Heinrich Wagner Sinto Maschinenfabrik GmbH (HWS).
Date: 2002-09-17
19 It should be observed at the outset that the Court has consistently held (see Case 34/82 Martin Peters Bauunternehmung [1983] ECR 987, paragraphs 9 and 10, Reichert and Kockler, paragraph 15, and Handte, paragraph 10) that the expressions `matters relating to a contract' and `matters relating to tort, delict or quasi-delict' in Article 5(1) and (3) of the Brussels Convention are to be interpreted independently, having regard primarily to the objectives and general scheme of the Convention. Those expressions cannot therefore be taken as simple references to the national law of one or the other of the Contracting States concerned.
20 Only such an interpretation is capable of ensuring the uniform application of the Brussels Convention, which is intended in particular to lay down common rules on jurisdiction for the courts of the Contracting States and to strengthen the legal protection of persons established in the Community by enabling the claimant to identify easily the court in which he may sue and the defendant reasonably to foresee in which court he may be sued (see Case C-295/95 Farrell [1997] ECR I-1683, paragraph 13, and Case C-256/00 Besix [2002] ECR I-1737, paragraphs 25 and 26).
21 As the Court has held, the concept of `matters relating to tort, delict or quasi-delict' within the meaning of Article 5(3) of the Brussels Convention covers all actions which seek to establish the liability of a defendant and which are not related to a `contract' within the meaning of Article 5(1) of the Convention (Kalfelis, paragraph 18, Reichert and Kockler, paragraph 16, and Case C-51/97 Réunion Européenne and Others [1998] ECR I-6511, paragraph 22).
22 Moreover, while Article 5(1) of the Brussels Convention does not require a contract to have been concluded, it is nevertheless essential, for that provision to apply, to identify an obligation, since the jurisdiction of the national court is determined, in matters relating to a contract, by the place of performance of the obligation in question.
23 Furthermore, it should be noted that, according to the Court's case-law, the expression `matters relating to contract' within the meaning of Article 5(1) of the Brussels Convention is not to be understood as covering a situation in which there is no obligation freely assumed by one party towards another (Handte, paragraph 15, and Réunion Européenne and Others, paragraph 17).
Finanzamt Hannover-Nord v Norddeutsche Gesellschaft zur Beratung und Durchführung von Entsorgungsaufgaben bei Kernkraftwerken mbH.
Date: 2002-09-17
18 In that regard it must be observed, first, that it is settled case-law that the granting of an interest-free loan to a company allows the company to have capital available without having to bear its cost; that the resultant saving in interest leads to an increase in its assets by allowing the company to avoid expenditure which it would otherwise have to bear; and that, by saving it that expense, the advantage of such a loan helps to strengthen the company's economic potential, and must therefore be regarded as likely to increase the value of the rights in the recipient company (Trave Schiffahrts-Gesellschaft, cited above, paragraphs 12 and 14, and Case C-287/94 Frederiksen [1996] ECR I-4581, paragraphs 12 and 13).
19 Article 4(2)(b) of Directive 69/335 is therefore to be interpreted as meaning that, where a company receives an interest-free loan from one of its shareholders, capital duty may be charged on the utility value of the loan, which is to say the amount of interest saved (see, to that effect, Trave Schiffahrts-Gesellschaft, cited above, paragraph 17, and Frederiksen, cited above, paragraph 14).
20 However it must be borne in mind that it is also clear from the case-law that, for the purposes of Article 4(2)(b) of Directive 69/335, a company's assets include all the property which the members have contributed, together with any increase in its value, and that a company which realises a profit and adds it to its reserves thereby increases its assets, whilst the assets of a company which incurs losses will decline (Siegen, cited above, paragraph 12).
21 The Court has inferred from that definition of a company's assets that, whilst the absorption by a member of losses incurred by a company must in principle be regarded as a contribution that increases the company's assets, the same is not true if such losses are absorbed under a profit and loss transfer agreement entered into before the losses were sustained, since it is the purport of such an undertaking that any losses incurred by the company subsequent thereto are to have no effect on the level of the company's assets (Siegen, cited above, paragraph 13).
Federal Republic of Germany v Commission of the European Communities.
Date: 2002-09-19
48 It is plain that the second inspection did not dispel the Commission's doubts but, instead, reinforced them. Although the information provided by the German authorities to the effect that, in Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, 90% of the blocks were under single crops or set aside could be considered essentially correct, to the nearest 5%, the Commission was entitled to consider, following that inspection, that the risk was not confined to the remaining 10% but could be more significant given the fact that, in a considerable number of cases, the agricultural parcels located in the blocks which were under a single crop or set aside did not correspond to registered parcels. They therefore could not be checked by sight and, if no measuring were carried out, could pose the risk of exaggeration of the areas declared.
51 As the Advocate General pointed out in paragraph 58 of her Opinion, the procedure for clearing the accounts serves to determine not only that the expenditure was actually and properly incurred but also that the financial burden of the common agricultural policy is correctly apportioned between the Member States and the Community, and, in that regard, the Commission has no discretionary power to derogate from the rules regulating the allocation of expenses (see Joined Cases 15/76 and 16/76 France v Commission [1979] ECR 321, paragraph 28).
61 The Commission also adds that the German Government was still able to express its views on the information contained in the supplement to the summary report, which was communicated to it before the contested decision was adopted.
Findings of the Court
Failure to comply with the conciliation procedure
62 It is necessary to consider whether, by informing the German Government of the four factors referred to in paragraph 55 of this judgment, and of the proposed correction of 5%, after the conclusion of the conciliation procedure, the Commission failed to comply with that procedure.
95 It should be noted, however, that where the Commission refuses to charge certain expenditure to the EAGGF on the ground that it was incurred as a result of breach of Community rules for which a Member State can be held responsible, the Commission is required not to demonstrate exhaustively that the checks carried out by the Member States are inadequate, but to provide evidence of the serious and reasonable doubt it entertains concerning the checks carried out by the national authorities. The reason for this mitigation of the burden of proof on the Commission is that it is the State which is best placed to collect and check the data required for the clearance of EAGGF accounts, and which is consequently required to adduce the most detailed and comprehensive evidence that its checks are actually carried out and, if appropriate, that the Commission's assertions are incorrect (Case C-242/97 Belgium v Commission [2000] ECR I-3421, paragraph 104).
DKV Deutsche Krankenversicherung AG v Office for Harmonisation in the Internal Market (Trade Marks and Designs).
Date: 2002-09-19
22 Second, it should be pointed out that the actual application by the Court of First Instance of that criterion to this case, as challenged by DKV, involves findings of a factual nature.  As the Advocate General has pointed out at point 58 et seq. of his Opinion, the Court of First Instance has exclusive jurisdiction to find the facts, save where a substantive inaccuracy in its findings is attributable to the documents submitted to it, and to appraise those facts. That appraisal thus does not, save where the clear sense of the evidence before it has been distorted, constitute a point of law which is subject, as such, to review by the Court of Justice on appeal (see, inter alia, judgment in Joined Cases C-280/99 P to C-282/99 P Moccia Irme and Others v Commission [2001] ECR I-4717, paragraph 78 and order in Case C-323/00 P DSG v Commission [2002] ECR I-0000, paragraph 34).
24 As to the complaint that the Court of First Instance failed to consider the overall impression conveyed by a composite sign (see, as regards Article 7(1)(c) of Regulation No 40/94, Case C-383/99 P Procter & Gamble v OHIM [2001] ECR I-6251, paragraph 40), that complaint is unfounded. As stated in paragraph 23 above, the Court of First Instance directed a significant part of its reasoning to considering, in relation to a sign composed of words, the sign's distinctiveness as a whole.
29 That reasoning is clearly not vitiated by any error of law. It is quite evident from the wording of Article 7(1) of Regulation No 40/94 that it is sufficient that one of the absolute grounds for refusal listed in that provision applies for the sign at issue not to be registrable as a Community trade mark.
Aventis Pharma Deutschland GmbH v Kohlpharma GmbH and MTK Pharma Vertriebs-GmbH.
Date: 2002-09-19
25 In those circumstances, it must be concluded, as have the Norwegian Government and the Commission, that the detailed and specific requirements regarding the packaging of the medicinal products which are the subject of a central marketing authorisation, which are intended to prevent consumers from being misled and thereby to protect public health, preclude the bundling of the packages of those medicinal products.
26 In the light of that conclusion, it is for the national court, having regard to the case-law of the Court and, in particular, the judgment in Case C-443/99 Merck, Sharp & Dohme [2002] ECR I-0000, paragraph 25, to examine whether the circumstances prevailing at the time of marketing in the Member State of importation make the creation of new packaging objectively necessary in order that the imported product can gain effective access to the market of that State.
Commission of the European Communities v French Republic.
Date: 2002-09-26
9 In that respect, it need simply be noted that according to settled case-law 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 (see, in particular, Case C-147/00 Commission v France [2001] ECR I-2387, paragraph 26) and that a Member State may not seek to rely on provisions, practices or circumstances in its internal legal order in order to justify failure to comply with the obligations and time-limits laid down in a directive (see, in particular, Case C-78/00 Commission v Italy [2001] ECR I-8195, paragraph 38).
Commission of the European Communities v Kingdom of Spain.
Date: 2002-10-03
15 In that regard, it should be pointed out that according to settled case-law 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, inter alia, Case C-148/00 Commission v Italy [2001] ECR I-9823, paragraph 7 and Case C-372/01 Commission v Luxembourg [2002] ECR I-0000, paragraph 7).
French Republic v Commission of the European Communities.
Date: 2002-10-03
34 It must be recalled in that regard that, according to settled case-law, the legality of a decision concerning aid is to be assessed in the light of the information available to the Commission when the decision was adopted (see, inter alia, Case C-288/96 Germany v Commission [2000] ECR I-8237, paragraph 34). As the Advocate General observes in point 20 of his Opinion, a Member State cannot rely before the Court on elements of fact which were not put forward in the course of the pre-litigation procedure laid down in Article 88 EC (Joined Cases C-278/92, C-279/92 and C-280/92 Spain v Commission [1994] ECR I-4103, paragraph 31, and Case C-382/99 Netherlands v Commission [2002] ECR I-0000, paragraphs 49 and 76).