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19. In relation to direct taxation, the Court has accepted, in cases relating to taxation of the income of natural persons, that the situation of residents and the situation of non-residents in a given State are not generally comparable, since there are objective differences between them, both from the point of view of the source of the income and from the point of view of their ability to pay tax or the possibility of taking account of their personal and family circumstances ( Schumacker , paragraphs 31 to 34, Case C-80/94 Wielockx [1995] ECR I‑2493, paragraph 18; and Case C‑107/94 Asscher [1996] ECR I‑3089, paragraph 41). The Court has made it clear, however, that, in the case of a tax advantage which is not available to a non-resident, a difference in treatment as between the two categories of taxpayer may constitute discrimination within the meaning of the Treaty where there is no objective difference between the situations of the two such as to justify different treatment in that regard ( Schumacker , paragraphs 36 to 38, and Asscher , paragraph 42).

25. Equating ‘sea’ within the meaning of Regulation No 3577/92 with ‘territorial sea’ within the meaning of the Montego Bay Convention is likely to undermine that objective. The application of that regulation solely to territorial sea, within the meaning of that convention, would preclude the liberalisation intended by that regulation of potentially significant maritime transport services where they operate on the landward side of the baseline of the territorial sea that States may draw, in accordance with that convention, across the natural entrance points of a bay.

26. Ainsi, il y a lieu de rappeler d’emblée que le système de protection des consommateurs mis en œuvre, notamment, par la directive 93/13/CEE du Conseil, du 5 avril 1993, concernant les clauses abusives dans les contrats conclus avec les consommateurs (JO L 95, p. 29), repose sur l’idée que le consommateur se trouve dans une situation d’infériorité à l’égard du professionnel en ce qui concerne tant le pouvoir de négociation que le niveau d’information (voir, notamment, arrêts du 14 juin 2012, Banco Español de Crédito, C‑618/10, point 39; du 21 mars 2013, RWE Vertrieb, C‑92/11, point 41, ainsi que du 30 mai 2013, Asbeek Brusse et de Man Garabito, C‑488/11, point 31).

30. Ainsi que la Cour l’a déjà jugé, une récupération tardive, postérieure aux délais impartis, ne saurait satisfaire aux exigences du traité (arrêts du 22 décembre 2010, Commission/Italie, C-304/09, non encore publié au Recueil, point 32; du 14 juillet 2011, Commission/Italie, C-303/09, non encore publié au Recueil, point 30, et Commission/Grèce, précité, point 60).

36. It is clear from the case-law of the Court, in particular from Belgium  v Commission , cited above (paragraphs 33 and 34) and from Case C-243/97 Greece v Commission [2000] ECR I-5813 (paragraph 53), that as regards the inspections carried out by Commission staff in connection with the clearance of EAGGF accounts, the Member State concerned cannot disprove the Commission's findings without substantiating its own claims by providing evidence of a reliable and operational supervisory system. If it is not able to show that they are inaccurate, the Commission's findings are likely to raise serious doubts as to the existence of an appropriate and effective body of supervisory measures and inspection procedures.

32 It follows from the foregoing that an official may not, by means of an action for damages, seek to obtain the same result as he would have obtained had he been successful in an action for annulment which he failed to commence in due time .

104 If the provisions in the statutes of a cooperative governing relations between itself and its members do not automatically escape the prohibition laid down in Article 85(1) of the Treaty (Oude Luttikhuis, cited above, paragraph 13), the same must be true a fortiori of provisions which produce effects vis-à-vis third parties which have not subscribed to them.

26 Second, it should be observed that, according to the 10th recital in the preamble to Directive 93/37, the aim of that directive is to ensure the development of effective competition in the award of public works contracts (see also, on the subject of Directive 71/305, Case 31/87 Beentjes [1988] ECR 4635, paragraph 21).

53. Moreover, an absolute prohibition of advertising the characteristics of a product is liable to impede access to the market by products from other Member States more than it impedes access by domestic products, with which consumers are more familiar (Case C-405/98 Gourmet International Products [2001] ECR I-1795, paragraph 21).

106 It is settled law that GATT, which according to its preamble is based on the principle of negotiations undertaken on the basis of "reciprocal and mutually advantageous arrangements", is characterized by the great flexibility of its provisions, in particular those conferring the possibility of derogation, the measures to be taken when confronted with exceptional difficulties and the settlement of conflicts between the contracting parties.

71. In paragraphs 24 and 25 of Case C-300/03 Honeywell Aerospace [2005] ECR I‑0000, the Court held that it follows from the very wording of Article 378(1) and Article 379(2) of the implementing regulation that notification by the office of departure to the principal of the time-limit by which the proof requested must be furnished is mandatory and must precede recovery of the customs debt. The time-limit is intended to protect the interests of the principal by allowing him three months in which to furnish, where appropriate, proof of the regularity of the transit operation or the place where the offence or irregularity was actually committed. In those circumstances, the Member State to which the office of departure belongs may recover import duties only if, in particular, it has indicated to the principal that he has three months in which to furnish the proof requested and such proof has not been provided within that period.

12 THIS DOUBLE AIM , WHICH IS AT ONCE ECONOMIC AND SOCIAL , SHOWS THAT THE PRINCIPLE OF EQUAL PAY FORMS PART OF THE FOUNDATIONS OF THE COMMUNITY .

42. As paragraphs 62 to 68 of the judgment in Case C‑275/06 Promusicae [2008] ECR I‑271 make clear, the protection of the fundamental right to property, which includes the rights linked to intellectual property, must be balanced against the protection of other fundamental rights.

50 In this context, it must be stated that there is, in the system established by Regulation No 2081/92, a division of powers between the Member State concerned and the Commission.

48. Regarding Troostwijk’s second argument with regard to the compatibility of the legislation in question with freedom of expression, it should be recalled that, according to settled case-law, fundamental rights form an integral part of the general principles of law the observance of which the Court ensures. For that purpose, the Court draws inspiration from the constitutional traditions common to the Member States and from the guidelines supplied by international treaties for the protection of human rights on which the Member States have collaborated or to which they are signatories. The ECHR has special significance in that respect (see, inter alia, Case C-260/89 ERT [1991] ECR I-2925, paragraph 41; Case C-274/99 P Connolly v Commission [2001] ECR I-1611, paragraph 37; Case C-94/00 Roquette Frères [2002] ECR I-9011, paragraph 25; and Case C-112/00 Schmidberger [2003] ECR I-5659, paragraph 71).

43. Accordingly, the Austrian legislation must be regarded as having existed on 31 December 1993 for the purposes of Article 57(1) EC.

60. It should be noted in this connection that, even if — in order to ensure full compliance with the Court’s judgment — the penalty payment should be payable in its entirety until such time as the Member State has taken all the measures necessary to bring to an end the failure to fulfil obligations established, nevertheless, in certain specific cases, a penalty which takes account of the progress that the Member State may have made in complying with its obligations may be envisaged (see, to that effect, judgments in Commission v Spain , EU:C:2003:635, paragraphs 43 to 51; in Commission v Italy , EU:C:2011:740, paragraphs 47 to 55; and in Commission v Belgium , EU:C:2013:659, paragraphs 73 and 74).

33 As regards the increase in sickness insurance contributions, however, the Austrian Government itself acknowledges that this was decided on in order to compensate for the reduction of the contributory financial transfers from pension insurance to the sickness insurance institutions, that reduction in turn being intended to reduce to a proper level the federal contribution to pension insurance so as to release the necessary resources for financing the new care allowance. The financing of that benefit was therefore made possible, without altering sickness, old-age and accident benefits, by means of increasing sickness insurance contributions. The link, albeit indirect, with sickness insurance contributions is all the stronger in that the abstraction of resources from sickness insurance is made from the contributory portion of receipts. Care allowance is therefore contributory in character.

70. The Court has, nevertheless, ruled that if the Member States remain, in essential respects, free to fix, in keeping with their domestic needs, the requirements of public policy and public security, as grounds for derogating from a fundamental freedom, those requirements must be interpreted strictly, so that their scope cannot be determined unilaterally without any control by the institutions of the European Community. So, public policy and public security may not be invoked unless there is a genuine and sufficiently serious threat to a fundamental interest of society (see, inter alia, Case C‑355/98 Commission v Belgium [2000] ECR I‑1221, paragraph 28; Case C‑54/99 Eglise de scientologie [2000] ECR I‑1335, paragraph 17; and Commission v Spain , paragraph 47).

46 In that regard, it must be pointed out that in its reply to questions put by the Court, the Commission explained that the declarations made by paid employees or by public servants are to be regarded as having been made by customs forwarding agents in the broad sense, given that, by virtue of the required level of specialization and the nature of their work, such persons may be treated as customs forwarding agents by occupation. In its reply to a question put by the Court at the hearing, the Commission nonetheless agreed that those persons, who make 22% of all declarations, are not subject to the business tariff. It follows that an importer does have a genuine choice in that he is not obliged to have recourse to a forwarding agent by occupation, and that consequently the tariff is not binding on anyone who wishes to make a customs declaration.

37. In the case of companies, their registered office for the purposes of Article 48 EC serves, in the same way as nationality in the case of individuals, as the connecting factor with the legal system of a State. Acceptance of the proposition that the Member State in which a subsidiary seeks to establish itself may freely apply different treatment merely by reason of the fact that the registered office of its parent company is situated in another Member State would deprive Article 43 EC of all meaning (see, to that effect, Case 270/83 Commission v France [1986] ECR 273, paragraph 18; Case C-330/91 Commerzbank [1993] ECR I‑4017, paragraph 13; Metallgesellschaft and Others , paragraph 42; and Marks & Spencer , paragraph 37). Freedom of establishment thus aims to guarantee the benefit of national treatment in the host Member State, by prohibiting any discrimination based on the place in which companies have their seat (see, to that effect, Commission v France , paragraph 14, and Saint‑Gobain ZN , paragraph 35).

15 IT APPEARS FROM ALL THESE CONSIDERATIONS THAT THE REGULATION COVERS ONLY IMPORT OR EXPORT TRANSACTIONS FOR WHICH THE PAYMENT OF DUTIES WAS MADE ON OR AFTER 1 JULY 1980 .

77 The fact that the State companies which succeeded British Coal were acquired subsequently in the context of an open and competitive tendering procedure under market conditions suggests that the element of aid enjoyed by British Coal and those State companies does not exist in relation to the private undertakings which won tenders, such as RJB. Since those undertakings bought the companies in question under non-discriminatory competitive conditions and, by definition, at the market price, that is to say at the highest price which a private investor acting under normal competitive conditions was ready to pay for those companies in the situation they were in, in particular after having enjoyed State aid, the aid element was assessed at the market price and included in the purchase price. In such circumstances, the undertakings to which the tenders were granted cannot be regarded as having benefited from an advantage in relation to other market operators (see, to that effect, Case C-305/89 Italy v Commission [1991] ECR I-1603, paragraph 40). Private undertakings such as RJB, to which tenders were awarded, could not therefore be asked to repay the aid element in question.

23 Since the referring court refers not only to Article 47 of the Charter, but also to Article 14 of the ICCPR and Article 6 of the ECHR, it should be recalled that, whilst, as Article 6(3) TEU confirms, fundamental rights recognised by the ECHR constitute general principles of EU law and whilst Article 52(3) of the Charter provides that the rights contained in the Charter which correspond to rights guaranteed by the ECHR are to have the same meaning and scope as those laid down by the ECHR, the latter does not constitute, as long as the European Union has not acceded to it, a legal instrument which has been formally incorporated into EU law (judgments of 26 February 2013 in Åkerberg Fransson, C‑617/10, EU:C:2013:105, paragraph 44; 3 September 2015 in Inuit Tapiriit Kanatami and Others v Commission, C‑398/13 P, EU:C:2015:535, paragraph 45; and 15 February 2016 in N., C‑601/15 PPU, EU:C:2016:84, paragraph 45). This finding also applies to the ICCPR. Accordingly, an examination of the validity of Directive 2006/112 must be undertaken solely in the light of the fundamental rights guaranteed by the Charter (see, to that effect, judgment of 15 February 2016 in N., C‑601/15 PPU, EU:C:2016:84, paragraph 46 and the case-law cited).

73. Detriment to the distinctive character of a mark with a reputation, also referred to as, inter alia, ‘dilution’, is caused when that mark’s ability to identify the goods or services for which it is registered is weakened, whilst detriment to the repute of the mark, also referred to as, inter alia, ‘tarnishment’, is caused when the goods or services for which the identical or similar sign is used by the third party may be perceived by the public in such a way that the trade mark’s power of attraction is reduced (see Case C‑487/07 L’Oréal and Others, paragraphs 39 and 40).

34 In the alternative, the Commission contends that, in any event, DSM's request that the Court of Justice order the Commission to repay the fine is inadmissible, since neither the Court of Justice nor the Court of First Instance may make such an order under Article 173 of the EC Treaty (now, after amendment, Article 230 EC).

66 It is indeed settled case-law that an appeal must indicate precisely the contested elements of the judgment which the appellant seeks to have set aside and also the legal arguments specifically advanced in support of the appeal (see, inter alia, judgments of 4 July 2000, Bergadem and Goupil v Commission, C‑352/98 P, EU:C:2000:361, paragraph 34; of 6 March 2003, Interporc v Commission, C‑41/00 P, EU:C:2003:125, paragraph 15; and of 12 September 2006, Reynolds Tobacco and Others v Commission, C‑131/03 P, EU:C:2006:541, paragraph 49).

45. Toutefois, cette obligation n’implique pas que le Tribunal soit tenu de reprendre, dans sa décision, toutes les allégations des parties ni qu’il doive prendre position à l’égard de chacune de ces allégations.

35. In that regard, it must be noted that in proceedings under Article 234 EC, which is based on a clear separation of functions between the national courts and the Court of Justice, any assessment of the facts in the case is a matter for the national court (see Case 36/79 Denkavit Futtermittel [1979] ECR 3439, paragraph 12, Case C-235/95 Dumon and Froment [1998] ECR I-4531, paragraph 25, and Joined Cases C-175/98 and C-177/98 Lirussi and Bizzaro [1999] ECR I-6881, paragraph 37, and Case C-282/00 RAR [2003] ECR I-4741, paragraph 46).

52. Although the time-limits prescribed by those articles are mandatory (see, to that effect, Molkereigenossenschaft Wiedergeltingen , paragraphs 38 to 40), the fact remains that they do not preclude the competent authorities of a Member State from making after-the-event checks and corrections for the purpose of ensuring that that Member State’s production does not exceed the guaranteed global quantity allocated to it.

61. À cet égard, à supposer même que les arrêts rendus au titre de l’article 226 CE aient les mêmes effets que ceux rendus au titre de l’article 234 CE et que, partant, des considérations de sécurité juridique puissent rendre nécessaire, à titre exceptionnel, la limitation de leurs effets dans le temps (voir, en ce sens, arrêt du 7 juin 2007, Commission/Grèce, C‑178/05, Rec. p. I‑4185, point 67 et jurisprudence citée), deux conditions doivent être remplies pour qu’une telle limitation puisse être prononcée par la Cour. La première est qu’il doit exister un risque de répercussions économiques graves dues en particulier au nombre élevé de rapports juridiques constitués de bonne foi sur la base de la réglementation considérée comme étant valablement en vigueur et la seconde est que les particuliers et les autorités nationales doivent avoir été incités à un comportement non conforme à la réglementation communautaire en raison d’une incertitude objective et importante quant à la portée des dispositions communautaires, incertitude à laquelle avaient éventuellement contribué les comportements mêmes adoptés par d’autres États membres ou par la Commission (voir, en ce sens, arrêts du 20 septembre 2001, Grzelczyk, C‑184/99, Rec. p. I‑6193, point 53; du 15 mars 2005, Bidar, C‑209/03, Rec. p. I‑2119, point 69, et du 18 janvier 2007, Brzeziński, C‑313/05, Rec. p. I‑513, point 57).

22. En effet, il existe un intérêt certain de l’Union à ce que, pour éviter des divergences d’interprétation futures, les dispositions ou les notions reprises du droit de l’Union reçoivent une interprétation uniforme, lorsqu’une législation nationale se conforme, pour les solutions qu’elle apporte à des situations ne relevant pas du champ d’application de l’acte de l’Union concerné, à celles retenues par ledit acte, afin d’assurer un traitement identique aux situations internes et aux situations régies par le droit de l’Union, quelles que soient les conditions dans lesquelles les dispositions ou les notions reprises du droit de l’Union sont appelées à s’appliquer (voir, en ce sens, arrêts Salahadin Abdulla e.a., précité, point 48; du 12 juillet 2012, SC Volksbank România, C‑602/10, points 87 et 88; Nolan, précité, point 46 et jurisprudence citée, ainsi que du 14 mars 2013, Allianz Hungária Biztosító e.a., C‑32/11, points 20 et 21).

48. In that context, the Court has held that any national measure adopted after a date thus fixed is not, by that fact alone, automatically excluded from the derogation laid down in the European Union measure in question. A provision which is, in essence, identical to the previous legislation, or limited to reducing or eliminating an obstacle to the exercise of rights and freedoms established by European Union law in the earlier legislation, will be covered by the derogation. By contrast, legislation based on an approach which differs from that of the previous law and establishes new procedures cannot be treated as legislation existing at the date fixed in the European Union measure in question (see Case C‑446/04 Test Claimants in the FII Group Litigation , paragraph 192, and Case C‑157/05 Holböck [2007] ECR I‑4051, paragraph 41).

22. Concentrating all the actions directly related to the insolvency of an undertaking before the courts of the Member State with jurisdiction to open the insolvency proceedings also appears consistent with the objective of improving the effectiveness and efficiency of insolvency proceedings having cross-border effects, referred to in recitals 2 and 8 in the preamble to Regulation No 1346/2000.

25 Second, it is important to note that freedom to provide services, as a fundamental principle of the Treaty, may be restricted only by rules which are justified by overriding reasons in the general interest and are applicable to all persons and undertakings pursuing an activity in the territory of the host Member State. Furthermore, in order to be so justified, the national legislation in question must be suitable for securing the attainment of the objective which it pursues and must not go beyond what is necessary in order to attain it (see, to that effect, Säger, paragraph 15; Case C-19/92 Kraus [1993] ECR I-1663, paragraph 32; Case C-55/94 Gebhard [1995] ECR I-4165, paragraph 37; and Guiot, paragraphs 11 and 13).

31 However, charges with no upper limit which increase directly in proportion to the nominal value of the capital raised cannot, by their very nature, amount to duties paid by way of fees or dues within the meaning of the Directive. Even if there may be a link in some cases between the complexity of a registration and the amount of capital raised, the amount of such charges will generally bear no relation to the costs actually incurred by the authority on the registration formalities (Fantask and Others, paragraph 31).

16 According to a consistent line of cases, the aim of Article 95 of the Treaty is to ensure free movement of goods between the Member States in normal conditions of competition by the elimination of all forms of protection which result from the application of internal taxation which discriminates against products from other Member States. The Court has made it clear, as regards the free movement of goods within the Community, that products which are in free circulation are definitively and wholly assimilated to products originating in Member States. It follows that Article 95 covers all products from Member States, including products originating in non-member countries which are in free circulation in the Member States (see the judgment in Case 193/85 Co-Frutta v Amministrazione delle Finanze dello Stato [1987] ECR 2085, paragraphs 25, 26 and 29).

60 IN THIS REGARD, IT IS SUFFICIENT TO POINT OUT THAT THE COURT HAS ALREADY STATED ( SEE THE JUDGMENT OF 27 JANUARY 1981 IN CASE 1251/79 ITALIAN REPUBLIC V COMMISSION (( 1981 )) ECR 205 ) THAT DECISIONS CONCERNING THE CLEARANCE OF ACCOUNTS DO NOT REQUIRE DETAILED REASONS IF THE GOVERNMENT CONCERNED WAS CLOSELY INVOLVED IN THE PROCESS BY WHICH THE DECISION CAME ABOUT AND IS THEREFORE AWARE OF THE REASON FOR WHICH THE COMMISSION CONSIDERS THAT IT MUST NOT CHARGE THE SUMS IN DISPUTE TO THE EAGGF .

53. According to settled case-law, the interpretation which, in the exercise of the jurisdiction conferred on it by Article 234 EC, the Court gives to a rule of Community law clarifies and defines, where appropriate, the meaning and scope of that rule as it must be, or ought to have been, understood and applied from the time it was brought into force. It follows that the rule as thus interpreted may, and must, be applied by the courts even to legal relationships which arose and were established before the judgment ruling on the request for interpretation, provided that in other respects the conditions for bringing a dispute relating to the application of that rule before the competent courts are satisfied (see, in particular, Case 24/86 Blaizot [1988] ECR 379, paragraph 27, and Case C-415/93 Bosman [1995] ECR I-4921, paragraph 141).

34. À cet égard, la Cour a précisé que, pour que des impôts, droits, prélèvements et taxes puissent relever de l’assiette de la TVA alors même qu’ils ne représentent pas de valeur ajoutée et qu’ils ne constituent pas la contrepartie économique de la livraison du bien, ils doivent présenter un lien direct avec cette livraison (arrêt Commission/Pologne, précité, point 30 et jurisprudence citée).

52 In that regard, it should be noted that the Court has already held that since the Commission did not determine the maximum annual amount of allowances in accordance with the requirements of subparagraph (b) of Article 10a(5) of Directive 2003/87, the correction factor laid down in Article 4 of, and Annex II to, Decision 2013/448 is also contrary to that provision (judgment of 28 April 2016, Borealis Polyolefine and Others, C‑191/14, C‑192/14, C‑295/14, C‑389/14 and C‑391/14 to C‑393/14, EU:C:2016:311, paragraph 98).

46 While the data on air quality for 2014 amount to events which took place after the reasoned opinion of 11 July 2014, those events are of the same kind as those to which the opinion referred and constitute the same conduct.

27. It is settled case-law that the Court of Justice has no jurisdiction to establish the facts or, in principle, to examine the evidence which the Court of First Instance accepted in support of those facts. Provided that the evidence has been properly obtained and the general principles of law and the rules of procedure in relation to the burden of proof and the taking of evidence have been observed, it is for the Court of First Instance alone to assess the value which should be attached to the evidence produced to it (Case C-185/95 P Baustahlgewebe v Commission [1998] ECR I-8417, paragraph 24). That appraisal does not therefore constitute, save where the clear sense of the evidence has been distorted, a point of law which is subject as such to review by the Court of Justice (Case C-8/95 P New Holland Ford v Commission [1998] ECR I-3175, paragraph 26, and Joined Cases C-24/01 P and C-25/01 P Glencore and Compagnie Continentale v Commission [2002] ECR I-10119, paragraph 65).

12 The aim of the regulation is to improve the efficiency of Community agricultural structures in accordance with Community concepts and criteria, and for that purpose it introduces a common measure in Article 1 and provides that the European Agricultural Guidance and Guarantee Fund is to make a contribution to the measures concerning investments in agricultural holdings, without specifying the legal form of those holdings.

76. In that regard, it is sufficient to recall that Community production exceeds the consumption of sugar in the Community, a fact which the Netherlands Government does not dispute, and that the Community is, in addition, obliged to import a certain quantity of sugar from non-Member States under the WTO Agreements ( Emesa Sugar , paragraph 56).

43. Accordingly, the Austrian legislation must be regarded as having existed on 31 December 1993 for the purposes of Article 57(1) EC.

54 It should be noted in that regard that the principle of effective judicial protection is a general principle of EU law, which is now set out in Article 47 of the Charter. Article 47 secures in EU law the protection afforded by Article 6(1) and Article 13 of the ECHR. It is necessary, therefore, to refer only to Article 47 (see, to that effect, judgment of 6 November 2012, Otis and Others, C‑199/11, EU:C:2012:684, paragraphs 46 and 47).

47. Article 47 of the Charter secures in EU law the protection afforded by Article 6(1) of the ECHR. It is necessary, therefore, to refer only to Article 47 (Case C‑386/10 P Chalkor v Commission [2011] ECR I‑13085, paragraph 51).

42. The proper conduct of that procedure constitutes an essential guarantee required by the EC Treaty not only in order to protect the rights of the Member State concerned, but also so as to ensure that any contentious procedure will have a clearly defined dispute as its subject-matter (see, to that effect, Commission v Netherlands , paragraph 19).

4. Selon l’article 3, paragraphe 1, dudit règlement, les aides individuelles, accordées en dehors de tout régime, qui remplissent toutes les conditions de ce même règlement sont compatibles avec le marché commun au sens de l’article 107, paragraphe 3, TFUE et sont exemptées de l’obligation de notification prévue à l’article 108, paragraphe 3, TFUE.

47. Furthermore, the derogations provided for in Articles 296 EC and 297 EC must, in accordance with settled case-law in respect of derogations from fundamental freedoms (see, inter alia, Case C‑503/03 Commission v Spain [2006] ECR I‑1097, paragraph 45; Case C‑490/04 Commission v Germany [2007] ECR I‑6095, paragraph 86; and Case C‑141/07 Commission v Germany [2008] ECR I‑6935, paragraph 50), be interpreted strictly.

43. Accordingly, the Austrian legislation must be regarded as having existed on 31 December 1993 for the purposes of Article 57(1) EC.

49. It is for the referring court to ascertain, in the light of the foregoing elements, in the context of a global assessment of all the facts characterising the transaction in question in the main proceedings (see, to that effect, Spijkers , paragraph 13; Case C‑29/91 Redmond Stichting [1992] ECR I‑3189, paragraph 24; Süzen , paragraph 14; and Allen and Others , paragraph 26) whether the identity of the economic entity transferred was preserved.

10 IT SHOULD BE NOTED THAT THE MAIN PURPOSE OF MR CASTAGNOLI' S COMPLAINT WAS TO CHALLENGE HIS RECRUITMENT AS A MEMBER OF THE AUXILIARY STAFF . HOWEVER, THAT DESCRIPTION OF HIS STATUS HAD BEEN EXPRESSLY AGREED UPON IN THE INITIAL CONTRACT OF EMPLOYMENT .

24 In that regard, it is sufficient to observe that although it is not for the Court of Justice, when ruling on questions of law in the context of an appeal, to substitute, on grounds of fairness, its own assessment for that of the Court of First Instance exercising its unlimited jurisdiction to rule on the amount of fines imposed on undertakings for infringements of Community law (Case C-310/93 P BPB Industries and British Gypsum v Commission [1995] ECR I-865, paragraph 34), the Court of Justice does nevertheless have jurisdiction to consider whether the Court of First Instance has responded to a sufficient legal standard to all the arguments raised by the appellant with a view to having the fine cancelled or reduced (Case C-219/95 P Ferriere Nord v Commission [1997] ECR I-4411, paragraph 31).

28. In the second place, as regards the objectives of Directive 2004/114, it can be seen from Article 1(a) of that directive, read in conjunction with recital 24 thereto, that the directive seeks to determine the conditions for the admission of third-country nationals to the territory of Member States for study purposes, for a period exceeding three months.

62. When a directive expressly requires that the measures transposing the directive contain a reference to it or be accompanied by such a reference at the time of their official publication, it is in any event necessary to adopt a specific measure transposing the directive (see Case C‑361/95 Commission v Spain [1997] ECR I-7351, paragraph 15, and judgment of 29 October 2009 in Case C‑551/08 Commission v Poland , paragraph 23).

27. Therefore, it is not permissible to equate the two terms.

20. Or, selon une jurisprudence constante, l’existence d’un manquement doit être appréciée en fonction de la situation de l’État membre telle qu’elle se présentait au terme du délai fixé dans l’avis motivé et les changements intervenus par la suite ne sauraient être pris en compte par la Cour (voir, notamment, arrêts du 27 octobre 2005, Commission/Luxembourg, C‑23/05, Rec. p. I‑9535, point 9, et du 6 mars 2008, Commission/Luxembourg, C‑340/07, point 6).

136 It follows that the situations were not comparable and there was no breach of the principle of equal treatment.

21 Consequently, where questions submitted by national courts concern the interpretation of a provision of Community law, the Court is, in principle, obliged to give a ruling (see Dzodzi and Gmurzynska-Bscher, cited above, paragraphs 35 and 20 respectively). Neither the wording of Article 177 nor the aim of the procedure established by that article indicates that the Treaty makers intended to exclude from the jurisdiction of the Court requests for a preliminary ruling on a Community provision where the domestic law of a Member State refers to that Community provision in order to determine the rules applicable to a situation which is purely internal to that State (see Dzodzi and Gmurzynska-Bscher, cited above, paragraphs 36 and 25 respectively).

20 Consequently, where the questions put by national courts concern the interpretation of a provision of Community law, the Court is, in principle, bound to give a ruling .

50. Article 12 requires only that the child have lived with his parents or with either parent in a Member State while at least one of the parents resided there as a worker (Case 197/86 Brown [1988] ECR 3205, paragraph 30, and Case C-480/08 Teixeira [2010] ECR I-1107, paragraph 52).

54 It should be noted as a preliminary observation, first, that there is no dispute that an obligation to purchase electricity produced from renewable energy sources at minimum prices, such as that laid down by Paragraphs 2 and 3 of the amended Stromeinspeisungsgesetz, confers a certain economic advantage on producers of that type of electricity, since it guarantees them, with no risk, higher profits than they would make in its absence.

46. It is thus clear from case-law that, whatever the mechanism adopted for preventing or mitigating the imposition of a series of charges to tax or economic double taxation, the freedoms of movement guaranteed by the Treaty preclude a Member State from treating foreign-sourced dividends less favourably than nationally-sourced dividends, unless such a difference in treatment concerns situations which are not objectively comparable or is justified by overriding reasons in the general interest (see, to that effect, Case C‑315/02 Lenz [2004] ECR I‑7063, paragraphs 20 to 49, and Case C‑319/02 Manninen [2004] ECR I‑7477, paragraphs 20 to 55). Likewise, as regards the decisions which Directive 90/435 leaves in the hands of the Member States, the Court has pointed out that these may be exercised only in compliance with the fundamental provisions of the Treaty, in particular those relating to freedom of establishment ( Keller Holding , paragraph 45).

40. Secondly, the Finnish, French and United Kingdom Governments maintain that the Finnish tax legislation is objectively justified by the need to ensure the cohesion of the national tax system (Case C-204/90 Bachmann [1992] ECR I-249; Case C-300/90 Commission v Belgium [1992] ECR  I‑305). In particular, they argue that, unlike in the case of the tax system examined in Verkooijen , there is in this case a direct link between the taxation of the company’s profits and the tax credit granted to the shareholder receiving the dividends. They point out that the tax credit is granted to the latter only on condition that that company has actually paid the tax on its profits. If that tax does not cover the minimum tax on the dividends to be distributed, that company is required to pay an additional tax.

34. In order to determine whether that is the case in a dispute such as that at issue in the main proceedings, it is therefore necessary to examine the basis and the detailed rules governing the bringing of the action (see, to that effect, Case C‑271/00 Baten [2002] ECR I‑10489, paragraph 31, and Case C‑266/01 Préservatrice foncière TIARD [2003] ECR I‑4867, paragraph 23).

25 According to the fifth recital in the preamble to Regulation No 1041/67 the aim of authorizing the Member States to require further evidence, before paying refunds, is to prevent abuses.

43 The Court's case-law shows that, for a person to be directly concerned by a Community measure, the latter must directly affect the legal situation of the individual and leave no discretion to the addressees of that measure who are entrusted with the task of implementing it, such implementation being purely automatic and resulting from Community rules without the application of other intermediate rules (see to that effect, in particular, International Fruit Company, cited above, paragraphs 23 to 29, Case 92/78 Simmenthal v Commission [1979] ECR 777, paragraphs 25 and 26, Case 113/77 NTN Toyo Bearing Company and Others v Council [1979] ECR 1185, paragraphs 11 and 12, Case 118/77 ISO v Council [1979] ECR 1277, paragraph 26, Case 119/77 Nippon Seiko and Others v Council and Commission [1979] ECR 1303, paragraph 14, Case 120/77 Koyo Seiko and Others v Council and Commission [1979] ECR 1337, paragraph 25, Case 121/77 Nachi Fujikoshi and Others v Council [1979] ECR 1363, paragraph 11, Joined Cases 87/77, 130/77, 22/83, 9/84 and 10/84 Salerno and Others v Commission and Council [1985] ECR 2523, paragraph 31, Case 333/85 Mannesmann-Röhrenwerke and Benteler v Council [1987] ECR 1381, paragraph 14, Case 55/86 Arposol v Council [1988] ECR 13, paragraphs 11 to 13, Case 207/86 Apesco v Commission [1988] ECR 2151, paragraph 12, and Case C-152/88 Sofrimport v Commission [1990] ECR I-2477, paragraph 9).

37 First, according to settled case-law, fundamental rights form an integral part of the general principles of law, whose observance the Court ensures. For that purpose, the Court draws inspiration from the constitutional traditions common to the Member States and from the guidelines supplied by international treaties for the protection of human rights on which the Member States have collaborated or to which they are signatories. The ECHR has special significance in that respect (see, in particular, Case C-260/89 ERT [1991] ECR I-2925, paragraph 41).

40. The Court has also held that, although the reasoned opinion must contain a coherent and detailed statement of the reasons which led the Commission to conclude that the State in question has failed to fulfil one of its obligations under the FEU Treaty, the letter of formal notice cannot be subject to such strict requirements of precision, since it cannot, of necessity, contain anything more than an initial brief summary of the complaints. There is therefore nothing to prevent the Commission from setting out in detail in the reasoned opinion the complaints which it has already made more generally in the letter of formal notice (see, to this effect, Commission v Spain , paragraph 29).

77 With reference to infringement of the right to property, the applicant submits that by depriving operators who traditionally marketed third-country bananas of market shares for a long period of time, the Regulation breached those operators' right to property and infringed their freedom to pursue their trade or business.

155. As regards the extent of judicial review, it is apparent from EU case-law that where the General Court is seised, in accordance with Article 263 TFEU, of an action for annulment of a decision applying Article 81(1) EC, the General Court must as a general rule undertake, on the basis of the evidence adduced by the applicant in support of the pleas in law put forward, a full review of the question whether or not the conditions for the application of that provision are met (see, to that effect, judgments in Remia and Others v Commission , EU:C:1985:327, paragraph 34; Chalkor v Commission , C‑386/10 P, EU:C:2011:815, paragraphs 54 and 62; and Otis and Others , C‑199/11, EU:C:2012:684, paragraph 59). The General Court must also establish of its own motion that the Commission has stated reasons for its decision (see, to that effect, judgments in Chalkor v Commission , EU:C:2011:815, paragraph 61 and the case-law cited, and Otis and Others , EU:C:2012:684, paragraph 60).

31 Accordingly, in order to determine whether an activity such as that of doctors in primary care teams falls within the scope of Directive 93/104, it is necessary first to consider whether that activity comes within the scope of the basic Directive.

65 It must also be borne in mind that, as the Court has held, in particular in Case 267/86 Van Eycke v ASPA [1988] ECR 4769, paragraph 16, Article 85 of the Treaty itself concerns only the conduct of undertakings and not legislation or regulations adopted by Member States. However, according to settled case-law of the Court of Justice, Article 85 of the Treaty, read in conjunction with Article 5, requires the Member States not to introduce or maintain in force measures, whether legislative or regulatory, which may render ineffective the competition rules applicable to undertakings. Such is the case, according to the same case-law, where a Member State requires or favours the adoption of agreements, decisions or concerted practices contrary to Article 85 of the Treaty or reinforces their effects or deprives its own legislation of its official character by delegating to private traders responsibility for taking decisions affecting the economic sphere (see also Case C-2/91 Meng [1993] ECR I-5751, paragraph 14; Case C-185/91 Reiff [1993] ECR I-5801, paragraph 14; Case C-245/91 Ohra Schadeverzekeringen [1993] ECR I-5851, paragraph 10; Case C-35/96 Commission v Italy [1998] ECR I-3851, paragraphs 53 and 54; and Case C-266/96 Corsica Ferries France v Gruppo Antichi Ormeggiatori del Porto di Genova and Others [1998] ECR I-3949, paragraphs 35, 36 and 49).

33. Il convient de rappeler, à cet égard, que la Cour a déjà jugé que, dans le cadre de cette disposition, l’État membre demandeur peut, aux fins de justifier le maintien de dispositions nationales préexistantes, invoquer le fait qu’il évalue le risque pour la santé publique autrement que le législateur de l’Union ne l’a fait dans la mesure d’harmonisation, des évaluations divergentes de ces risques pouvant légitimement être effectuées, sans nécessairement être fondées sur des données scientifiques différentes ou nouvelles (arrêt Danemark/Commission, C‑3/00, EU:C:2003:167, point 63).

32. Secondly, it should be borne in mind that the Court has consistently held that Article 3 of Directive 76/207, which corresponds to Article 5 of that directive in its original version, is unconditional and sufficiently precise to be relied on by an individual against the State (see Case 152/84 Marshall [1986] ECR 723, paragraph 52, and Case C‑188/89 Foster and Others [1990] ECR I‑3313, paragraph 21) and that one of the entities against which provisions of a directive capable of having direct effect may be enforced is a body which, whatever its legal form, has been made responsible, pursuant to a measure adopted by a public authority, for providing, subject to the control of that public authority, a service in the public interest and which, for those purposes, enjoys exceptional powers as compared with the rules applicable to relations between individuals (see, to that effect, Foster and Others , paragraph 22). As the referring court states – and neither the parties to the main proceedings nor the Commission contest the point – the NÖ-LLWK is one of the bodies which enjoys exceptional powers as compared with the rules applicable to relations between individuals.

12 The essential aim of Directives 75/442 and 78/319, set out in their preambles in the third and fourth recitals respectively, namely the protection of human health and the safeguarding of the environment, would be jeopardized if the application of those directives were dependent on whether or not the holder intended to exclude all economic reutilization by others of the substances or objects of which he disposes .

62 Lastly, with regard to the standard of proof required to demonstrate circumvention where there is insufficient or indeed no cooperation on the part of producer-exporters, it should be noted that there is no provision in the basic regulation which confers on the Commission, in an investigation to establish whether there has been circumvention, the power to compel producers or exporters which are the subject of a complaint to participate in the investigation or to provide information. The Commission is therefore reliant on the voluntary cooperation of the interested parties to provide it with the necessary information (judgment of 4 September 2014, Simon, Evers & Co., C‑21/13, EU:C:2014:2154, paragraph 32).

48. Moreover, the court second seised is never in a better position than the court first seised to determine whether the latter has jurisdiction. That jurisdiction is determined directly by the rules of the Brussels Convention, which are common to both courts and may be interpreted and applied with the same authority by each of them (see, to that effect, Overseas Union Insurance , paragraph 23).

34 As regards Article 43 of the Treaty, it is settled case-law that that article is the appropriate legal basis for any legislation concerning the production and marketing of the agricultural products listed in Annex II to the EC Treaty which contributes to the attainment of one or more of the objectives of the common agricultural policy set out in Article 39 of the EC Treaty (now Article 33 EC) (Case 68/86 United Kingdom v Council [1988] ECR 855, paragraph 14, Case C-180/96 United Kingdom v Commission [1998] ECR I-2265, paragraph 133 and Commission v Council, cited above, paragraph 47). Moreover, Article 42 of the Treaty authorises the Council to provide for the grant of aid for production of and trade in agricultural products, account being taken of the objectives set out in Article 39, notwithstanding the provisions of the chapter of the Treaty which concern rules on competition.

70. In addition, because of the lack of direct contact between consumer and operator, games of chance accessible via the internet involve different and more substantial risks of fraud by operators against consumers compared with the traditional markets for such games.

45 As regards the grounds put forward as justification by the Hungarian Government, the Court has already held that it follows both from the wording of Article 14 of Directive 2006/123 and from the general scheme of the directive that no justification can be given for the requirements listed in that article (judgment in Rina Services and Others, C‑593/13, EU:C:2015:399, paragraphs 28 to 35).

137. In a situation such as that in the present case, the liability of Areva and Alstom, as parent companies, for the infringement committed is wholly derived from the liability of a subsidiary which belonged to those companies in succession (see, by analogy, Case C‑286/11 P Commission v Tomkins [2013] ECR, paragraphs 43 and 49).

78. Clause 4(1) of the framework agreement prohibits, in a general manner and in unequivocal terms, any difference in treatment of fixed-term workers in respect of employment conditions which is not objectively justified. Thus, its subject-matter appears therefore to be sufficiently precise to be relied upon by an individual and to be applied by the national court ( Impact , paragraph 60, and Case C‑486/08 Zentralbetriebsrat der Landeskrankenhäuser Tirols [2010] ECR I‑00000, paragraph 24).

24. Taking those considerations into account, the Court held in particular that Clause 4.1 of the framework agreement on fixed-term work is unconditional and sufficiently precise for individuals to be able to rely upon it before a national court (see Impact , point 2 of the operative part of the judgment). The Court has further made clear that Clause 4.2 of that framework agreement simply articulates one of the consequences which may be associated, where appropriate, subject to judicial control, with the application of the principle of non-discrimination in favour of fixed-term workers, without in any way undermining the substance of that principle ( Impac t, paragraph 65).

16 According to the Commission, however, the Xerox 3010 and Xerox 3010 Editor machines must be classified as photocopiers under sub-heading 9009 12 00.

27. It is therefore necessary to examine whether national legislation, such as that at issue in the main proceedings, affects the powers that the NRA concerned derives from the abovementioned provisions of the Framework Directive and the Universal Service Directive.

20 The Fund is responsible for paying the fixed portion of the salaries payable to notaries and other civil servants; it also meets the cost of training notaries and of acquiring office space and equipment for them; and, subject to authorisation from the Ministry of Justice, it covers other expenditure in the field of legal administration (Modelo I, paragraph 20).

39. For the sake of completeness, it must be noted that, as recitals 3, 21 and 24 in the preamble to Regulation No 1782/2003 make clear, environmental protection forms part of the objectives of the single payment scheme. The Court has also held that environmental protection, one of the essential objectives of the European Union, must be regarded as forming part of the common agricultural policy (Case C-428/07 Horvath [2009] ECR I-6355, paragraph 29). Moreover, Article 2 point (1) of Regulation No 796/2004 expressly provides that arable land, and consequently agricultural areas pursuant to Article 2(a) of Regulation No 795/2004, is land maintained in good agricultural and environmental condition within the meaning of Article 5 of Regulation No 1782/2003.

45 In the second place, the Court has held that, in order to fall within the concept of ‘communication to the public’ the work broadcast must be transmitted to a ‘new public’, that is to say, to a public which was not taken into account by the authors of the protected works when they authorised their use by the communication to the original public (see, to that effect, judgments of 7 December 2006 in SGAE, C‑306/05, EU:C:2006:764, paragraphs 40 and 42, and 4 October 2011 in Football Association Premier League and Others, C‑403/08 and C‑429/08, EU:C:2011:631, paragraph 197).

90. In the light of the foregoing, as observed by the Advocate General at point 12 of his Opinion, the plea of inadmissibility raised by the Commission, the ECTA, France Telecom and Ausbanc Consumo must be upheld and the second ground of appeal rejected in its entirety as inadmissible. The third ground of appeal, alleging errors of law in the assessment of the dominant position

61. With regard to an insured person whose travel to another Member State is for reasons relating to tourism or education, for example, and not to any inadequacy in the health service to which he is affiliated, the rules of the Treaty on freedom of movement offer no guarantee that all hospital treatment services which may have to be provided to him unexpectedly in the Member State of stay will be neutral in terms of cost. Given the disparities between one Member State and another in matters of social security cover and the fact that the objective of Regulation No 1408/71 is to coordinate the national laws but not to harmonise them, the conditions attached to a hospital stay in another Member State may, according to the circumstances, be to the insured person’s advantage or disadvantage (see, by analogy, Joined Cases C‑393/99 and C‑394/99 Hervein and Others [2002] ECR I‑2829, paragraphs 50 to 52; Case C‑387/01 Weigel [2004] ECR I‑4981, paragraph 55; and Case C‑392/05 Alevizos [2007] ECR I‑3505, paragraph 76).

Il ressort de ces éléments que l’attribution de la compétence d’exécution au Conseil était justifiée, dans les règlements ayant précédé le règlement n° 267/2012, par la cohérence requise entre les désignations adoptées dans le cadre de la politique étrangère et de sécurité commune et celles adoptées sur le fondement du traité FUE (arrêt du 1er mars 2016, National Iranian Oil Company/Conseil, C‑440/14 P, EU:C:2016:128, point 63).

40. The measures prohibited by Article 56(1) EC, as restrictions on the movement of capital, include those which are likely to discourage non‑residents from making investments in a Member State or to discourage that Member State’s residents from doing so in other States (see van Hilten-van der Heijden , paragraph 44, and Case C-370/05 Festersen [2007] ECR I-1129, paragraph 24).

51. However, in certain circumstances, several formally distinct services, which could be supplied separately and thus give rise, in turn, to taxation or exemption, must be considered to be a single transaction when they are not independent.

41 It follows that Article 5(1) of the Brussels Convention must be interpreted as meaning that, as regards contracts of employment, the place of performance of the relevant obligation, for the purposes of that provision, is the place where the employee actually performs the work covered by the contract with his employer (Mulox IBC, paragraph 20, Rutten, paragraph 15, and GIE Groupe Concorde, paragraph 14).

73. In that connection, it should be recalled that the requirement of transparency of contractual terms laid down by Articles 4(2) and 5 of Directive 93/13, which, moreover, have identical scope, cannot be reduced merely to their being formally and grammatically intelligible (see, to that effect, Kásler and Káslerné Rábai , EU:C:2014:282, paragraphs 69 and 71).

83. As regards the concept of the ‘exercise of official authority’ within the meaning of the first paragraph of Article 45 EC, the assessment of that concept must take account, in accordance with settled case-law, of the character as European Union law of the limits imposed by that provision on the permitted exceptions to the principle of freedom of establishment, so as to ensure that the effectiveness of the Treaty in the field of freedom of establishment is not frustrated by unilateral provisions of the Member States (see, to that effect, Reyners , paragraph 50; Commission v Greece , paragraph 8; and Case C‑438/08 Commission v Portugal [2009] ECR I‑10219, paragraph 35).

19 IN FACT , WHENEVER A WORKER HAS A STABLE EMPLOYMENT IN A MEMBER STATE THERE IS A PRESUMPTION THAT HE RESIDES THERE , EVEN IF HE HAS LEFT HIS FAMILY IN ANOTHER STATE .

70. It must be borne in mind, in that regard, that the Court has already held that the use by an advertiser, in a comparative advertisement, of a sign identical with, or similar to, the mark of a competitor for the purposes of identifying the goods and services offered by the latter and to compare its own goods or services therewith, is use ‘in relation to goods or services’ for the purposes of Article 5(1) of Directive 89/104 (see O2 Holdings and O2 (UK) , paragraphs 35, 36 and 42, and L’Oréal and Others , paragraphs 52 and 53).

43. Furthermore, that request must be sent in an equivalent manner to all undertakings which are in the same situation, unless there is an objectively verifiable ground capable of justifying different treatment of the tenderers in that regard, in particular where the tender must, in any event, in the light of other factors, be rejected.

27. Moreover, that conclusion is not called into question by the Greek Government’s submission that the dies a quo is the day that the competent authorities discover the irregularity. That view is contrary to the Court’s case-law that the date on which the authorities become aware of an irregularity is irrelevant to the starting point of the limitation period (judgment in Pfeifer & Langen , C‑52/14, EU:C:2015:381, paragraph 67).

67. Accordingly, the date on which the national authorities became aware of an irregularity is irrelevant to the starting point of that limitation period. Apart from the fact that there is nothing in the wording of Article 3(1) of Regulation No 2988/95 enabling an inference to the contrary, it has already been pointed out, in paragraph 64 of the present judgment, that the national administration has a general obligation of due diligence in the verification of payments which it makes from the EU budget, which means that it must take steps to rectify irregularities promptly (see, to that effect, judgments in Z e Fu Fleischhandel and Vion Trading , C‑201/10 and C‑202/10, EU:C:2011:282, paragraph 44, and Cruz & Companhia , C‑341/13, EU:C:2014:2230, paragraph 62).

23. Thus, the Court has held that agreements entered into within the framework of collective bargaining between employers and employees and intended to improve employment and working conditions must, by virtue of their nature and purpose, be regarded as not falling within the scope of Article 101(1) TFEU (see, to that effect, judgments in Albany , EU:C:1999:430, paragraph 60; Brentjens’ , EU:C:1999:434, paragraph 57; Drijvende Bokken , EU:C:1999:437, paragraph 47; Pavlov and Others , C‑180/98 to C‑184/98, EU:C:2000:428, paragraph 67; van der Woude , EU:C:2000:475, paragraph 22; and AG2R Prévoyance , C‑437/09, EU:C:2011:112, paragraph 29).

26. In those circumstances, the fact that a non-resident worker does not have a sufficiently substantial occupation in the Member State concerned is capable of constituting a legitimate justification for a refusal to grant the social advantage at issue.

28. Consequently, it has been held that a refusal to allow a parent, whether a national of a Member State or of a third country, who is the carer of a minor child who is a Union citizen to reside with that child in the host Member State would deprive the child’s right of residence of any useful effect, since enjoyment by a young child of a right of residence necessarily implies that the child is entitled to be accompanied by the person who is his primary carer and accordingly that the carer must be in a position to reside with the child in the host Member State for the duration of such residence (see Zhu and Chen , paragraph 45, and Iida , paragraph 69).

53. In accordance with that case-law, such legislation may be justified in order to meet imperative requirements, on condition that it is appropriate for securing the attainment of the objective pursued and that it does not go beyond what is necessary in order to attain that objective ( Commission v Italy , paragraph 59 and case-law cited).

25. The overall assessment of the employment relationship of the applicant in the main proceedings makes it necessary to take into account factors relating not only to the number of working hours and the level of remuneration but also to any rights to paid leave, to the continued payment of wages in the event of sickness, and to a contract of employment which is subject to the relevant collective agreement, to the payment of contributions and, if this applies, to the nature of those contributions (see, to that effect, judgment in Genc , C‑14/09, EU:C:2010:57, paragraph 27).

35 Consequently, it must be held that, by precluding by regulation or administrative practice on the grounds of their nationality employed or self-employed workers from other Member States and the members of their families from being attributed large-family status for the purpose of the award of special benefits for such families and from being awarded family allowances, the Hellenic Republic has failed to fulfil its obligations under Articles 48 and 52 of the EC Treaty, Article 7 of Regulation No 1612/68, Article 7 of Regulation No 1251/70, Article 7 of Directive 75/34 and Article 3 of Regulation No 1408/71.

61. En outre, une opération de valorisation n’est complète que si elle a pour conséquence que la substance en question a acquis les mêmes propriétés et caractéristiques qu’une matière première et est utilisable dans les mêmes conditions de précaution pour l’environnement (voir arrêts ARCO Chemie Nederland e.a., précité, points 94 et 96, ainsi que Palin Granit, point 46).

41. À cet égard, la Cour a jugé que la libre circulation des capitaux peut être limitée par des mesures nationales justifiées par les raisons mentionnées à l’article 58 CE ou par des raisons impérieuses d’intérêt général, pour autant qu’il n’existe pas de mesure communautaire d’harmonisation prévoyant des mesures nécessaires pour assurer la protection de ces intérêts (voir arrêts du 28 septembre 2006, Commission/Pays-Bas, C‑282/04 et C‑283/04, Rec. p. I‑9141, point 32; Commission/Allemagne, précité, point 72, ainsi que du 14 février 2008, Commission/Espagne, précité, point 35).

28 As regards the main objective of Directive 98/59, namely to make collective redundancies subject to prior consultation with the workers’ representatives and prior notification of the competent public authority, it should be noted, first, that under Article 2(2) of the directive the consultations are to cover ways and means of avoiding collective redundancies or reducing the number of workers affected, and of mitigating the consequences by recourse to accompanying social measures aimed, inter alia, at aid for redeploying or retraining workers made redundant. Secondly, according to Article 2(3) and Article 3(1) of the directive, employers are to notify the public authority of any projected collective redundancies and to forward to them the material and information mentioned in those provisions (see, to that effect, judgment of 10 December 2009, Rodríguez Mayor and Others , C‑323/08, EU:C:2009:770, paragraphs 43 and 44).

45. Under Article 225 EC and Article 58 of the Statute of the Court of Justice, an appeal lies on a point of law only. It follows that, save where the clear sense of the evidence has been distorted, the Court has no jurisdiction to review the assessment of the facts made by the Court of First Instance (see, inter alia , Joined Cases C-280/99 P, C-281/99 P and C-282/99 P Moccia Irme and Others v Commission [2001] ECR I-4717, paragraph 78, and Case C-104/00 P DKV v OHIM [2002] ECR I-7561, paragraph 22).

125. According to settled case-law, the status of citizen of the Union is destined to be the fundamental status of nationals of the Member States, enabling those among such nationals who find themselves in the same situation to enjoy the same treatment in law irrespective of their nationality, subject to such exceptions as are expressly provided for in that regard (see, in particular, Case C-184/99 Grzelczyk [2001] ECR I-6193, paragraph 31; Case C-224/98 D’Hoop [2002] ECR I-6191, paragraph 28; Case C-148/02 Garcia Avello [2003] ECR I-11613, paragraphs 22 and 23; and Case C-224/02 Pusa [2004] ECR I-5763, paragraph 16).

63. Furthermore, it must be stated that, since the Explanatory Notes to the CN are intended to facilitate the interpretation of the CN for the purposes of tariff classification, they must be interpreted in such a way as to ensure that the subheadings of the CN are properly applied.

42. Enfin, s’agissant de l’argument de la République italienne tiré de l’impossibilité de récupérer les aides accordées à Sardegna Flotta Sarda en raison de l’état de cessation d’activité de cette dernière, il est de jurisprudence constante que le fait que des entreprises bénéficiaires sont en difficulté ou en faillite n’affecte pas l’obligation de récupération de l’aide, l’État membre étant tenu, selon le cas, de provoquer la liquidation de la société (voir, notamment, arrêts du 15 janvier 1986, Commission/Belgique, 52/84, Rec. p. 89, point 14, ainsi que du 8 mai 2003, Italie et SIM 2 Multimedia/Commission, C‑328/99 et C-399/00, Rec. p. I-4035, point 69), de faire inscrire sa créance au passif de l’entreprise (voir, notamment, arrêts du 21 mars 1990, Belgique/Commission, dit «Tubemeuse», C-142/87, Rec. p. I‑959, points 61 à 64; Italie et SIM 2 Multimedia/Commission, précité, point 85, ainsi que du 14 avril 2011, Commission/Pologne, C‑331/09, Rec. p. I-2933, point 60) ou de prendre toute autre mesure permettant le remboursement de l’aide (arrêt du 6 décembre 2007, Commission/Italie, C-280/05, point 28).

14 IN THOSE CIRCUMSTANCES THE ONLY DEFENCE LEFT TO THE BELGIAN GOVERNMENT IN OPPOSING THE COMMISSION ' S APPLICATION FOR A DECLARATION THAT IT FAILED TO FULFIL ITS TREATY OBLIGATIONS WOULD BE TO PLEAD THAT IT WAS ABSOLUTELY IMPOSSIBLE FOR IT TO IMPLEMENT THE DECISION PROPERLY . IN THIS CONNECTION IT SHOULD BE NOTED THAT THE DECISION DEMANDS THE WITHDRAWAL FROM THE UNDERTAKING OF A CAPITAL HOLDING OF BFR 475 MILLION , THE ACQUISITION OF WHICH WAS DECIDED UPON BY THE REGIONAL AUTHORITIES ON 3 AUGUST 1981 AND EFFECTED BY A PUBLIC REGIONAL HOLDING COMPANY ; THAT DEMAND IS SUFFICIENTLY PRECISE TO BE COMPLIED WITH . THE FACT THAT , ON ACCOUNT OF THE UNDERTAKING ' S FINANCIAL POSITION , THE BELGIAN AUTHORITIES COULD NOT RECOVER THE SUM PAID DOES NOT CONSTITUTE PROOF THAT IMPLEMENTATION WAS IMPOSSIBLE , BECAUSE THE COMMISSION ' S OBJECTIVE WAS TO ABOLISH THE AID , AND , AS THE BELGIAN GOVERNMENT ITSELF ADMITS , THAT OBJECTIVE COULD BE ATTAINED BY PROCEEDINGS FOR WINDING UP THE COMPANY , WHICH THE BELGIAN AUTHORITIES COULD INSTITUTE IN THEIR CAPACITY AS SHAREHOLDER OR CREDITOR .

39 First, the Community institutions have a wide measure of discretion in agricultural matters and, second, Regulation No 3887/92 provides for penalties graduated according to the seriousness and magnitude of the irregularity committed (see, to that effect, Case C-354/95 National Farmers' Union and Others [1997] ECR I-4559, paragraph 53 and 54).

26. The referring court is also uncertain whether it is to be inferred from the objectives of the VAT Directive that the tax authorities may gather evidence obtained in the context of a criminal procedure, including by secret means, and use it as the basis for an administrative decision. In this connection, referring to the judgment in Åkerberg Fransson (C‑617/10, EU:C:2013:105), it raises the question of what limits the Charter places on the institutional and procedural autonomy of the Member States.

49 The Community legislature confirmed that essential function of trade marks by providing, in Article 2 of the Directive, that signs which are capable of being represented graphically may constitute a trade mark only if they are capable of distinguishing the goods or services of one undertaking from those of other undertakings (see, inter alia, Merz & Krell, paragraph 23).

77. In particular, to the extent that State financial aid for higher education studies is intended to encourage the pursuit of such studies both in Luxembourg and in any other country, the existence of a reasonable probability that the recipients of that aid will return to settle in Luxembourg and make themselves available to the labour market of that Member State, in order to contribute to its economic development, may be established on the basis of elements other than a prior residence requirement in relation to the student concerned.

21. Thirdly, as regards the first paragraph of Article 7 of Decision No 1/80, it is settled case-law that the rights accorded by that provision to the members of a Turkish worker’s family who satisfy the conditions set out in that paragraph cannot be restricted except in accordance with Article 14(1) of that decision, namely on grounds of public policy, public security or public health, or because of the fact that the party concerned has left the territory of the host Member State for a significant length of time without legitimate reason (Case C-329/97 Ergat [2000] ECR I-1487, paragraphs 45, 46 and 48; Case C‑467/02 Cetinkaya [2004] ECR I-10895, paragraphs 36 and 38; and Case C‑373/03 Aydinli [2005] ECR I-0000, paragraph 27).

En deuxième lieu, contrairement à ce que soutient Sea Handling, se fonder sur le règlement n° 659/1999 afin de justifier l’existence de la présomption générale de confidentialité, telle qu’elle est visée au point 37 du présent arrêt, n’aboutit pas à priver de tout effet utile le droit d’accès aux documents tel qu’il est consacré par le règlement n° 1049/2001. En effet, comme il a été établi au point 39 du présent arrêt, cette présomption générale n’est pas irréfragable et n’exclut pas que certains des documents contenus dans le dossier de la Commission relatif à une procédure de contrôle des aides d’État puissent être divulgués.

28. Although the main actions — since they seek to avoid the infringement of rights that are under threat — must necessarily be based on hypotheses which are by their nature uncertain, they are, according to the referring court, none the less permitted under German law. Since, in proceedings of the kind provided for in Article 267 TFEU, the interpretation of national law falls exclusively to the referring court (judgment in Križan and Others , C‑416/10, EU:C:2013:8, paragraph 58), the fact that the OMT decisions have not yet been implemented and that their implementation will be possible only after further legal acts have been adopted is not a ground for denying that the request for a preliminary ruling meets an objective need for resolving the cases brought before that court (see, by analogy, judgment in Bosman , C‑415/93, EU:C:1995:463, paragraph 65).

25 Since fiscal cohesion is secured by a bilateral convention concluded with another Member State, that principle may not be invoked to justify the refusal of a deduction such as that in issue.

70. In that regard, it should be recalled that the annex, to which Article 3(3) of the directive refers, contains only an indicative and non-exhaustive list of terms which may be regarded as unfair (see Invitel , paragraph 25 and case-law cited).

54. As regards the registration as trade marks of colours per se , not spatially delimited, the fact that the number of colours actually available is limited means that a small number of trade mark registrations for certain services or goods could exhaust the entire range of the colours available. Such an extensive monopoly would be incompatible with a system of undistorted competition, in particular because it could have the effect of creating an unjustified competitive advantage for a single trader. Nor would it be conducive to economic development or the fostering of the spirit of enterprise for established traders to be able to register the entire range of colours that is in fact available for their own benefit, to the detriment of new traders.

27. On the other hand, if those courts or tribunals consider that recourse to European Union law is necessary to enable them to decide a case, Article 267 TFEU imposes, in principle, an obligation on them to refer to the Court of Justice any question of interpretation which may arise (see Cilfit and Others , paragraphs 11 to 20).

28. From the outset, it should be noted that, as is apparent from the preamble thereto, the directive seeks to promote the free movement of capital, which is considered essential to the creation of an economic union whose characteristics are similar to those of a domestic market. The pursuit of such an objective presupposes, so far as taxation on the raising of capital is concerned, the abolition of indirect taxes in force in the Member States until then and the imposition in place of them of a duty charged only once in the common market and at the same level in all the Member States.

32. According to settled case-law, a benefit may be regarded as a social security benefit in so far as it is granted to the recipients, without any individual and discretionary assessment of personal needs, on the basis of a legally defined position and relates to one of the risks expressly listed in Article 4(1) of Regulation No 1408/71 (see, in particular, Case C‑286/03 Hosse [2006] ECR I‑1771, paragraph 37; Joined Cases C‑396/05, C‑419/05 and C‑450/05 Habelt and Others [2007] ECR I‑11895, paragraph 63; and Case C‑228/07 Petersen [2008] ECR I‑6989, paragraph 19).

10 Secondly, an application to have an additive included on the list in question may be rejected by the competent administrative authorities only if the additive does not meet any genuine need, in particular a technological need, or presents a danger to public health.

31. It also follows from the Court’s case-law that, while recourse to Article 95 EC as a legal basis is possible if the aim is to prevent future obstacles to trade resulting from the heterogeneous development of national laws, the emergence of such obstacles must be likely and the measure in question must be designed to prevent them (see, to that effect, Case C-350/92 Spain v Council [1995] ECR I-1985, paragraph 35, Germany v Parliament and Council , paragraph 86, Case C-377/98 Netherlands v Parliament and Council [2001] ECR I-7079, paragraph 15, and British American Tobacco (Investments) and Imperial Tobacco , paragraph 61).

86 It is true, as the Court observed in paragraph 35 of its judgment in Spain v Council, cited above, that recourse to Article 100a as a legal basis is possible if the aim is to prevent the emergence of future obstacles to trade resulting from multifarious development of national laws. However, the emergence of such obstacles must be likely and the measure in question must be designed to prevent them.

44 In the absence of Community rules governing the matter, the Member States remain competent to impose penalties for breach of such an obligation, provided that the penalties applicable are comparable to those which apply to similar national infringements. However, Member States may not lay down a penalty so disproportionate as to create an obstacle to the free movement of persons, such as a term of imprisonment (see, in particular, Case C-265/88 Messner [1989] ECR 4209, paragraph 14, and Case C-193/94 Skanavi and Chryssanthakopoulos [1996] ECR I-929, paragraph 36). The same considerations apply as regards breach of the obligation to present an identity card or a passport upon entry into the territory of a Member State.

76. Or, ainsi qu’il ressort de l’examen du premier grief, l’application d’un taux réduit de TVA aux livraisons de chevaux lorsque ces derniers ne sont pas destinés à être utilisés dans la préparation des denrées alimentaires ou dans la production agricole viole les articles 96 à 99 et l’annexe III de la directive TVA.

35. As the Court has already held on the basis of a number of recitals in the preamble to Directive 96/9, including recitals 39, 42 and 48, that objective is to stimulate the establishment of data storage and processing systems which contribute to the development of an information market against a background of exponential growth in the amount of information generated and processed annually in all sectors of activity (see, inter alia, The British Horseracing Board and Others , paragraphs 30 and 31; Case C‑46/02 Fixtures Marketing [2004] ECR I‑10365, paragraph 33; and Case C‑604/10 Football Dataco and Others [2012] ECR I‑0000, paragraph 34).

42. Such legislation would constitute an obstacle to the freedom to provide services guaranteed by Article 49 EC. That provision precludes the application of any national rules which have the effect of making the provision of services between Member States more difficult than the provision of services purely within a Member State (see, inter alia, Smits and Peerbooms , paragraph 61, and Schwarz and Gootjes‑Schwarz , paragraph 67 and case-law cited).

97. Consequently, it must be held that the legislation at issue, even if it is appropriate for ensuring the protection of animal health and the health of the operator carrying out the insemination, goes beyond what is necessary to attain the objective pursued (see, to that effect, Case C-347/04 Rewe Zentralfinanz [2007] ECR I‑2647, paragraph 37, and Case C-464/05 Geurts and Vogten [2007] ECR I‑9325, paragraph 24).

50 However, as the Advocate General pointed out in point 39 of his Opinion, it is clear from Article 5(1)(a) of Directive 69/335 that future contributions may also give rise to the levying of capital duty. Payments which a natural or legal person is obliged to make and which are definite are to be regarded as coming within the scope of that provision.

59. However, it cannot be denied that the withdrawal of that advantage constitutes a clear disadvantage in terms of cash-flow. In this connection, the Court has repeatedly held that the exclusion of a cash-flow advantage in a cross-border situation where it is available in an equivalent domestic situation is a restriction on the freedom of establishment (see, to that effect, inter alia, Joined Cases C-397/98 and C-410/98 Metallgesellschaft and Others [2001] ECR I-1727, paragraphs 44, 54 and 76; Case C-436/00 X and Y [2002] ECR I-10829, paragraphs 36 to 38; Case C-446/03 Marks & Spencer [2005] ECR I-10837, paragraph 32; and Case C-347/04 Rewe Zentralfinanz [2007] ECR I-2647, paragraph 29).

19. Par conséquent, les dispositions concernant lesdites exonérations doivent recevoir une interprétation autonome, fondée sur leur libellé et sur les finalités poursuivies par la directive 2003/96 (arrêt du 1 er décembre 2011, Systeme Helmholz, C-79/10, non encore publié au Recueil, point 19).

37. In particular, it is for each Member State to organise, in compliance with EU law, its system for taxing distributed profits and, in that context, to define the tax base and the tax rate which apply to the shareholder receiving them (see, inter alia, Test Claimants in Class IV of the ACT Group Litigation , paragraph 50; Test Claimants in the FII Group Litigation , paragraph 47; Case C-194/06 Orange European Smallcap Fund [2008] ECR I-3747, paragraph 30; and Case C-128/08 Damseaux [2009] ECR I-6823, paragraph 25, and Commission v Germany , paragraph 45).

103 Consequently, the ban on the export of live bovine animals cannot be regarded as a manifestly inappropriate measure.

81 Thus, it is following a schematic interpretation of the relevant EU rules that the Court of Justice interpreted those rules as meaning that, as from 2000, the Commission is required to comply with a legal time limit when adopting a decision on financial corrections (see judgments of 4 September 2014, Spain v Commission, C‑192/13 P, EU:C:2014:2156, paragraphs 56 to 82, and of 4 September 2014, Spain v Commission, C‑197/13 P, EU:C:2014:2157, paragraphs 56 to 82).

81. In addition, concerning more particularly Regulation No 1386/2002, the purpose of which is to lay down the procedure for implementing Regulation No 1164/94, as amended, of which the provision at issue in the present dispute forms part, the view advanced by the Commission, and affirmed by the General Court in paragraphs 36 and 39 of the judgment under appeal, that Article 18 of Regulation No 1386/2002 merely fixes the date when the time-limit for taking a decision under Article H(2) of Annex II to Regulation No 1164/94, as amended, starts to run, cannot be accepted, since the European Union legislature could not have set the starting point for a time-limit for adopting a decision under Article H if such a time-limit did not exist.

45 The free movement of capital, as a fundamental principle of the Treaty, may be restricted only by national rules which are justified by reasons referred to in Article 73d(1) of the Treaty or by overriding requirements of the general interest and which are applicable to all persons and undertakings pursuing an activity in the territory of the host Member State. Furthermore, in order to be so justified, the national legislation must be suitable for securing the objective which it pursues and must not go beyond what is necessary in order to attain it, so as to accord with the principle of proportionality (see, to that effect, Joined Cases C-163/94, C-165/94 and C-250/94 Sanz de Lera and Others [1995] ECR I-4821, paragraph 23, and Case C-54/99 Église de scientologie [2000] ECR I-1335, paragraph 18).

48. Differences of that kind are such as to render those procedures incompatible.

34. In answering the first question, it should be remembered first of all that, in accordance with settled case-law, all the authorities of the Member States have the task of ensuring observance of the rules of Community law within the sphere of their competence (see Case C-8/88 Germany v Commission [1990] ECR I‑2321, paragraph 13, and Kühne & Heitz , paragraph 20).

39. For the sake of completeness, it must be noted that, as recitals 3, 21 and 24 in the preamble to Regulation No 1782/2003 make clear, environmental protection forms part of the objectives of the single payment scheme. The Court has also held that environmental protection, one of the essential objectives of the European Union, must be regarded as forming part of the common agricultural policy (Case C-428/07 Horvath [2009] ECR I-6355, paragraph 29). Moreover, Article 2 point (1) of Regulation No 796/2004 expressly provides that arable land, and consequently agricultural areas pursuant to Article 2(a) of Regulation No 795/2004, is land maintained in good agricultural and environmental condition within the meaning of Article 5 of Regulation No 1782/2003.

34 As the Court has consistently held (see, inter alia, the judgment in Case C-260/89 Elliniki Radiophonia Tileorassi AE [1991] ECR I-2925, paragraph 41), fundamental rights form an integral part of the general principles of law, the observance of which the Court observes. For that purpose the Court draws inspiration from the constitutional traditions common to the Member States and from the guidelines supplied by international treaties for the protection of human rights on which the Member States have collaborated or of which they are signatories. The European Convention on Human Rights has special significance in that respect. It follows that the Community cannot accept measures which are incompatible with observance of human rights thus recognized and guaranteed.

20 Therefore it is necessary to determine whether or not the advantages arising from a system such as that applicable to the ISR are to be viewed as being granted through State resources.

29. In that regard, the Court has held that the taking into account of the actual depreciation of the vehicles need not necessarily involve an assessment or expert examination of each of them. To avoid the administrative burden inherent in such a system, a Member State may establish, by means of fixed scales determined by statute, regulation or administrative provision and calculated on the basis of criteria such as a vehicle’s age, mileage, general condition, propulsion method, make or model, a value for second-hand vehicles which, as a general rule, would be very close to their actual value ( Gomes Valente, paragraph 24, and Weigel , paragraph 73).

51 The definition of the onset of the employer's insolvency cannot, nevertheless, be equated purely and simply, as the plaintiffs in the main proceedings maintain, with the date when payment of remuneration ceases. For the purpose of identifying the outstanding claims which must be guaranteed by the Directive, Articles 3 and 4(2) refer to a period prior to the date of the onset of insolvency. If the argument of the plaintiffs in the main proceedings were accepted, the necessary conclusion would be that, prior to that date, the employer had not, by definition, ceased paying remuneration, with the result that Articles 3 and 4(2) would be rendered nugatory.

75 Secondly, it should be recalled that the case which led to the judgment in Kuwait Petroleum, cited above, concerned vouchers offered by a petrol company to consumers with the purchase of a certain quantity of fuel which could be exchanged free of charge for gifts chosen from a special catalogue. The Court held that the offer of such gifts could not be regarded as constituting a rebate or discount under Article 11(A)(3)(b) of the Sixth Directive but was to be deemed to be a supply for valuable consideration and thus a taxable transaction under Article 5(6) of the Sixth Directive (Kuwait Petroleum, paragraphs 16, 17 and 31). Under that provision, the application by a taxable person of goods forming part of his business assets for his private use or that of his staff, or the disposal thereof free of charge, where the value added tax on the goods in question was wholly or partly deductible, are to be treated as supplies made for consideration.

32 It must be borne in mind from the outset that, although direct taxation falls within their competence, the Member States must none the less exercise that competence consistently with Community law and avoid any discrimination on grounds of nationality (Case C-264/96 ICI [1998] ECR I-4695, paragraph 19; Case C-55/00 Gottardo [2000] ECR I-413, paragraph 32). Freedom of establishment

135. As is confirmed by the second subparagraph of Article 22(2) of Regulation No 1408/71, the sole purpose of Article 22(1)(c)(i) of that regulation is to confer on patients covered by the legislation of one Member State and granted authorisation by the competent institution the right to have access to ‘treatment’ in another Member State on conditions for reimbursement as favourable as those enjoyed by patients covered by the legislation of that other State (see Vanbraekel , paragraph 32, and Inizan , paragraph 21).

41. En effet, conformément au principe de hiérarchie des normes, un acte établi d’un commun accord par les institutions de l’Union, tel que la réglementation commune, ne saurait fonder une interprétation contra legem de l’article 263, dernier alinéa, TFUE (voir, par analogie, arrêt Italie et Donnici/Parlement, C-393/07 et C-9/08, EU:C:2009:275, point 47).

9. It is necessary, first of all, to point out that it is settled case-law that the exemptions provided for in Article 13 of the Sixth Directive constitute independent concepts of Community law whose purpose is to avoid divergences in the application of the VAT system as between one Member State and another (see, inter alia, Case C‑349/96 CPP [1999] ECR I‑973, paragraph 15, and Case C-8/01 Taksatorringen [2003] ECR I‑13711, paragraph 37, and the case-law cited).

20 As the Advocate General observes in point 25 of his Opinion, the TVergG does not contain any specific provisions on challenges to, or withdrawals by, members of the Landesvergabeamt.

28. Article 1(3) of Regulation No 258/97 introduces merely the possibility of determining, ‘where necessary’, whether a type of food or food ingredient falls within the scope of that regulation under what is known as the ‘comitology’ procedure laid down in Article 13 thereof (see Case C‑383/07 M‑K Europa [2009] ECR I‑115, paragraph 40). However, it is not incumbent on an undertaking to initiate the procedure laid down in Article 13 ( M‑K Europa , paragraph 43).

74. Thus, clause 5(1) of the Framework Agreement requires Member States, in order to ‘prevent abuse arising from the use of successive fixed-term employment contracts or relationships’, to adopt one or more of the measures listed where domestic law does not include ‘equivalent legal measures’ to prevent such abuse. The measures listed in clause 5(1)(a) to (c), of which there are three, relate, respectively, to objective reasons justifying the renewal of such contracts or relationships, the maximum total duration of successive fixed-term employment contracts or relationships, and the number of renewals of such contracts or relationships (see Case C‑268/06 Impact [2008] ECR I‑2483, paragraph 69, and order in Vassilakis and Others , paragraph 80).

92. The Court has also held, with regard to national schemes which contain a minimum social security benefit, that supplements to such a benefit, even if they principally benefit men because of the application of rules requiring the taking into account of the spouse’s income, were in principle justifiable under Directive 79/7 ( Teuling , paragraph 17, and Molenbroek , paragraphs 16 and 17).

177. In that regard, it must be borne in mind that the Court of First Instance has exclusive jurisdiction to find and appraise the relevant facts and also to assess the evidence. The appraisal of those facts and the assessment of that evidence thus does not, save where they distort the evidence, constitute a point of law which is subject, as such, to review by the Court of Justice on appeal (see, in particular, Mag Instrument v OHIM , cited above, paragraph 39).

88. According to settled case-law, the statement of reasons required by Article 253 EC must be appropriate to the act at issue and must disclose in a clear and unequivocal fashion the reasoning followed by the institution which adopted the measure in question in such a way as to enable the persons concerned to ascertain the reasons for the measure and to enable the Court to carry out its review. It is not necessary for the reasoning to go into all the relevant facts and points of law, since the question whether the statement of reasons meets the requirements of Article 253 EC must be assessed with regard not only to its wording but also to its context and to all the legal rules governing the matter in question (see, inter alia, Case C-56/93 Belgium v Commission [1996] ECR I-723, paragraph 86, Case C-278/95 P Siemens v Commission [1997] ECR I-2507, paragraph 17, and Case C-501/00 Spain v Commission [2004] ECR I-6717, paragraph 73).

45. En quatrième lieu, ainsi que le gouvernement espagnol l’a souligné dans ses écrits de procédure, l’article 60, paragraphe 1, de la LEC vise notamment à éviter des décisions contradictoires par l’attribution de la compétence à une seule juridiction. Une telle règle pourrait ainsi être de nature à assurer une pratique uniforme sur l’ensemble du territoire national, contribuant de cette façon à la sécurité juridique (voir, par analogie, arrêt Agrokonsulting-04, précité, point 56).

19 The German Government further argues that a different view ought to be taken in this case, since what is at issue is not the concept of a worker within the meaning of Article 48 of the Treaty, as in particular in the Levin case, but the concept of a worker within the meaning of social security law. It maintains that the definition of the concept of a worker in the latter sphere falls within the competence of the Member States.

15 AN INTERPRETATION WHICH REFLECTS THE FULL SCOPE OF THESE CONCEPTS IS ALSO IN CONFORMITY WITH THE OBJECTIVES OF THE TREATY WHICH INCLUDE , ACCORDING TO ARTICLES 2 AND 3 , THE ABOLITION , AS BETWEEN MEMBER STATES , OF OBSTACLES TO FREEDOM OF MOVEMENT FOR PERSONS , WITH THE PURPOSE INTER ALIA OF PROMOTING THROUGHOUT THE COMMUNITY A HARMONIOUS DEVELOPMENT OF ECONOMIC ACTIVITIES AND A RAISING OF THE STANDARD OF LIVING . SINCE PART-TIME EMPLOYMENT , ALTHOUGH IT MAY PROVIDE AN INCOME LOWER THAN WHAT IS CONSIDERED TO BE THE MINIMUM REQUIRED FOR SUBSISTENCE , CONSTITUTES FOR A LARGE NUMBER OF PERSONS AN EFFECTIVE MEANS OF IMPROVING THEIR LIVING CONDITIONS , THE EFFECTIVENESS OF COMMUNITY LAW WOULD BE IMPAIRED AND THE ACHIEVEMENT OF THE OBJECTIVES OF THE TREATY WOULD BE JEOPARDIZED IF THE ENJOYMENT OF RIGHTS CONFERRED BY THE PRINCIPLE OF FREEDOM OF MOVEMENT FOR WORKERS WERE RESERVED SOLELY TO PERSONS ENGAGED IN FULL-TIME EMPLOYMENT AND EARNING , AS A RESULT , A WAGE AT LEAST EQUIVALENT TO THE GUARANTEED MINIMUM WAGE IN THE SECTOR UNDER CONSIDERATION .

27. Second, the reasoned opinion must contain a cogent and detailed exposition of the reasons which led the Commission to the conclusion that the Member State concerned had failed to fulfil one of its obligations under the Treaty (see, inter alia, Case C-207/96 Commission v Italy [1997] ECR I-6869, paragraph 18, and Case C-439/99 Commission v Italy , cited above, paragraph 12).

37. In the light of all those considerations, the answer to the third part of the first question must be that Article 30(2) of the Universal Service Directive does not preclude the adoption of a national measure such as that at issue in the main proceedings which fixes in advance and on the basis of an abstract model of the costs maximum prices which may be charged by the donor operator to the recipient operator as set-up costs, provided that the prices are fixed on the basis of the costs in such a way that consumers are not dissuaded from making use of the facility of portability. The second question

34. In the first place, as regards the overall scheme of Regulation No 44/2001, it must be recalled that the first sentence of Article 24 of Regulation No 44/2001 provides for a rule of jurisdiction based on the entering of an appearance by the defendant in respect of all disputes where the jurisdiction of the court seised is not derived from other provisions of that regulation. That provision applies also in cases where the court has been seised in breach of the provisions of that regulation and implies that the entering of an appearance by the defendant may be considered to be a tacit acceptance of the jurisdiction of the court seised and thus a prorogation of that court’s jurisdiction (Case C‑111/09 ČPP Vienna Insurance Group [2010] ECR I‑4545, paragraph 21).

16 IN VIEW OF THEIR AIMS THOSE REQUIREMENTS OF COMMUNITY LAW, THAT IS TO SAY, THE EXISTENCE OF A JUDICIAL REMEDY AND THE DUTY TO STATE REASONS, ARE HOWEVER LIMITED ONLY TO FINAL DECISIONS REFUSING TO RECOGNIZE EQUIVALENCE AND DO NOT EXTEND TO OPINIONS AND OTHER MEASURES OCCURRING IN THE PREPARATION AND INVESTIGATION STAGE .

101 The provisions of Article 9 of Directive 64/221, which are complementary to those relating to the system of appeals to a court of law referred to in Article 8 and are intended to mitigate the effect of deficiencies in those remedies (see, in particular, Case 98/79 Pecastaing [1980] ECR 691, paragraphs 15 and 20), call for a broad interpretation as regards the persons to whom they apply. In the field of Community law, the requirement for judicial review of any decision of a national authority reflects a general principle stemming from the constitutional traditions common to the Member States and enshrined in Articles 6 and 13 of the Convention (Case 222/86 Unectef v Heylens and Others [1987] ECR 4097, paragraph 14, Case C-97/91 Oleificio Borelli v Commission [1992] ECR I-6313, paragraph 14, and Case C-226/99 Siples [2001] ECR I-277, paragraph 17).

62. Accordingly, by systematically exempting works and development programmes and projects which are subject to a declaratory system from the procedure of assessment of their implications for the site, the French Republic has failed to fulfil its obligations under Article 6(3) of the Habitats Directive. The third complaint: failure to examine alternative solutions – Arguments of the parties

21. On that point, it should be noted that, as the Court of Justice emphasized in its judgment in Hauptzollamt Hamburg-Jonas v Dimex (Case 89/83 [1984] ECR 2815, paragraph 8), the system of differentiated export refunds is intended to gain or to maintain access for Community exports to the markets of the non-member countries concerned, the reason for differentiated refunds being the desire to take account of the particular characteristics of each import market in which the Community wishes to play a part.

41 In support of that interpretation, it must be stated that Articles 3 and 4 of Directive 91/271 impose on Member States the same deadlines for, as regards Article 3, providing agglomerations with a collecting system for urban waste water and, as regards Article 4, subjecting that water to secondary treatment or equivalent before discharge. Were the Commission’s interpretation of Article 4 of Directive 91/271 to be accepted, the deadlines laid down in that article would have to be at one year’s distance from those indicated in Article 3 of the directive, that one-year gap allowing Member States to carry out the collection of samples, in accordance with Annex I.D to the directive. However, no period additional to that granted in Article 3 of Directive 91/271 is provided to Member States for the purpose of complying with the requirements of Article 4 of the directive.

112 In reaching that conclusion, the Court found that the sectoral pension funds in question in the cases mentioned in the paragraph above themselves determined the amount of the contributions and benefits, that they operated in accordance with the principle of capitalisation and that, by contrast with the benefits provided by bodies charged with the management of compulsory social security schemes of the kind in point in Poucet and Pistre, the amount of benefits provided by the funds depended on the performance of the investments which they made and in respect of which they were subject, like an insurance company, to supervision by the Insurance Board. Furthermore, the fact that a sectoral pension fund was in certain circumstances required or empowered to exempt undertakings from membership meant that it was carrying on an economic activity in competition with insurance companies (see Albany, paragraphs 81 to 84, Brentjens', paragraphs 81 to 84, and Drijvende Bokken, paragraphs 71 to 74).

38 As the Court has consistently held, Article 27(2) is intended to ensure that a judgment is not recognized or enforced under the Convention if the defendant has not had an opportunity of defending himself before the court first seised (Case 166/80 Klomps v Michel [1981] ECR 1593, paragraph 9, and Case C-123/91 Minalmet v Brandeis [1992] ECR I-5661, paragraph 18).

49. Next, the fact that aid also has beneficial effects for the region or the economic sector concerned does not necessarily imply that it must be considered to be compatible with the common market. It follows from Article 87(3)(c) EC that, where an aid measure affects trading conditions to an extent contrary to the common interest, it cannot be declared compatible with the common market, irrespective of its possible beneficial effects. However, when assessing the effects on trade, the Commission must take into consideration all the characteristics of the measure and the market concerned (see Case 47/69 France v Commission [1970] ECR 487, paragraphs 7 to 9).

41 It must, however, be ascertained whether there is an alternative measure less prejudicial to the exercise of the rights conferred by Article 21 TFEU which would be equally effective in achieving the objective of preventing the risk of impunity for a person alleged to have committed a criminal offence.

16. According to settled case‑law, that is a broad definition covering all forms of comparative advertising, so that, in order for there to be comparative advertising, it is sufficient for there to be a statement referring even by implication to a competitor or to the goods or services which he offers (see Case C‑112/99 Toshiba Europe [2001] ECR I‑7945, paragraphs 30 and 31, and Case C‑44/01 Pippig Augenoptik [2003] ECR I-3095, paragraph 35).

43. Accordingly, the Austrian legislation must be regarded as having existed on 31 December 1993 for the purposes of Article 57(1) EC.

52. Although such a taxable person could be obliged, when there are indications pointing to an infringement or fraud, to make enquiries about the trader from wh om he intends to purchase goods or services in order to ascertain the latter’s trustworthiness, the tax authorities cannot, however, as a general rule, require that taxable person, first, to ensure that the issuer of the invoice relating to the goods and services in respect of which the exercise of that right to deduct is sought was in possession of the goods at issue and was in a position to supply them and that he has complied with his obligations as regards the declaration and payment of VAT, in order to be satisfied that there are no irregularities or fraud at the level of the traders operating at an earlier stage of the transaction or, second, to be in possession of documents in that regard (see, to that effect, judgments in Mahagében and Dávid , C‑80/11 and C‑142/11, EU:C:2012:373, paragraphs 60 and 61; Stroy trans , C‑642/11, EU:C:2013:54, paragraph 49, and order in Jagiełło , C‑33/13, EU:C:2014:184, paragraphs 38 and 39).

43. Accordingly, the Austrian legislation must be regarded as having existed on 31 December 1993 for the purposes of Article 57(1) EC.

35. The fact that the General Court, on the merits, arrived at a different conclusion from the appellant cannot in itself vitiate the judgment for failure to state reasons (Case C‑362/05 P Wunenburger v Commission [2007] ECR I‑4333, paragraph 80).

25 In reply to that point it is sufficient to say that equal treatment between men and women in relation to pay is a fundamental principle of Community law and that, given the direct effect of Article 119, its application by employers must be immediate and full.

44 In that regard, the General Court correctly pointed out, in paragraph 111 of the judgment under appeal, that it is apparent from the settled case-law of the Court that the right to claim the protection of legitimate expectations presupposes that three cumulative conditions are satisfied, including the condition that precise, unconditional and consistent assurances must have been given by the EU administration (see, to that effect, judgments of 18 July 2007, AER v Karatzoglou, C‑213/06 P, EU:C:2007:453, paragraph 33, and of 16 December 2008, Masdar (UK) v Commission, C‑47/07 P, EU:C:2008:726, paragraph 81). The General Court went on, in paragraphs 113 to 116 of the judgment under appeal, to hold that those three conditions were not satisfied in the present case.

2. Council Regulation (EC) No 40/94 of 20 December 1993 on the Community trade mark (OJ 1994 L 11, p. 1) was repealed and replaced by Council Regulation (EC) No 207/2009 of 26 February 2009 on the Community trade mark (OJ 2009 L 78, p. 1), which entered into force on 13 April 2009. However, having regard to the material time, the present dispute continues to be governed by Regulation No 40/94.

57. According to the case-law the principles of which were set out in Vlassopoulou , the authorities of a Member State, when considering a request by a national of another Member State for authorisation to exercise a regulated profession, must take into consideration the professional qualification of the person concerned by making a comparison between the qualifications certified by his diplomas, certificates and other formal qualifications and by his relevant professional experience and the professional qualifications required by the national rules for the exercise of the profession in question (see, most recently, Case C-232/99 Commission v Spain [2002] ECR I-4235, paragraph 21).

26 It follows that charges such as those at issue in the main proceedings, levied when an increase in a company's share capital is recorded in a commercial register, constitute a tax within the meaning of Directive 69/335.

46. The Court has consistently held that where a capital item is used both for business and for private purposes the taxpayer has the choice, for the purposes of VAT, of (i) allocating that item wholly to the assets of his business, (ii) retaining it wholly within his private assets, thereby excluding it entirely from the system of VAT, or (iii) – as in the case before the national court – integrating it into his business only to the extent to which it is actually used for business purposes (see, to that effect, Case C‑415/98 Bakcsi [2001] ECR I‑1831, paragraphs 24 to 34, and Case C‑269/00 Seeling [2003] ECR I‑4101, paragraphs 40 and 41).

17 Consequently, the answer given to the second and third questions must be that Articles 59 and 60 of the Treaty do not cover the situation where a national of a Member State goes to reside in the territory of another Member State and establishes his principal residence there in order to provide or receive services there for an indefinite period .

39. Since the Parliament and the French Government submit in their respective pleadings that a large part of the appeal is inadmissible on the ground that the appellant merely reproduces his pleas in law to the Court of First Instance without indicating precisely the contested passages of the judgment under appeal or the legal arguments specifically advanced in support of the appeal, it should be noted that under Article 225 EC, the first paragraph of Article 58 of the Statute of the Court of Justice and Article 112(1), first subparagraph, (c) of the Rules of Procedure of the Court of Justice, an appeal must indicate precisely the contested elements of the judgment which the appellant seeks to have set aside and also the legal arguments specifically advanced in support of the appeal. That requirement is not satisfied by an appeal which, without even including an argument specifically identifying the error of law allegedly vitiating the judgment under appeal, merely repeats or reproduces verbatim the pleas in law and arguments previously submitted to the Court of First Instance (Case C‑352/98 P Bergaderm and Goupil v Commission [2000] ECR I-5291, paragraphs 34 and 35, and Case C-76/01 P Eurocoton and Others v Council [2003] ECR I‑10091, paragraphs 46 and 47).

55 It is true that the solution thus imposed by the wording of Article 17(2)(a) of the Sixth Directive may not appear fully consistent with the purpose of that provision and with certain objectives pursued by the Sixth Directive, such as fiscal neutrality and the avoidance of double taxation.

73. Ensuring such judicial protection for the person who has made the request and to whom the institution has refused to grant access to one or more documents originating from a Member State following an objection by that State means that the European Union judicature must assess the lawfulness of the decision to refuse access in the specific case (see, in that respect, Case C-266/05 P Sison v Council [2007] ECR I-1233, paragraphs 33 to 39), in the light of all relevant factors, among the most important of which are the documents whose disclosure has been refused. To comply with the prohibition of disclosure of the documents in question without the prior agreement of the Member State concerned, the General Court must consult the documents in camera , so that the parties themselves do not have access to them, as provided for by the third indent of Article 67(3) of the Rules of Procedure of the General Court.

63. Selon une jurisprudence constante de la Cour, l’existence d’un manquement doit être appréciée en fonction de la situation de l’État membre telle qu’elle se présentait au terme du délai fixé dans l’avis motivé et les changements intervenus par la suite ne sauraient être pris en compte par la Cour, quand bien même ils constitueraient une transposition correcte de la règle de droit de l’Union faisant l’objet du recours en manquement (arrêt Commission/Grèce, C‑407/09, EU:C:2011:196, point 16 et jurisprudence citée).

34. However, the Commission is required not to show exhaustively that the checks carried out by the national authorities were inadequate or that the figures they have transmitted are irregular, but to produce evidence of its serious and reasonable doubt regarding such checks or figures (see Case C‑54/95 Germany v Commission [1999] ECR I‑35, paragraph 35).

35 It should be borne in mind here that where the Commission refuses to charge certain expenditure to the EAGGF on the ground that it was incurred as a result of breaches of Community rules for which a Member State can be held responsible, the Commission is required not to demonstrate exhaustively that there are irregularities in the data submitted by the Member States but to adduce evidence of serious and reasonable doubt on its part regarding the figures submitted 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 verify the data required for the clearance of EAGGF accounts; consequently, it is for the State to adduce the most detailed and comprehensive evidence that its figures are accurate and, if appropriate, that the Commission's calculations are incorrect (Case C-48/91 Netherlands v Commission [1993] ECR I-5611, paragraphs 16 and 17).

18. Article 13A of the Sixth Directive relates to the exemption from VAT of certain activities in the public interest. That exemption does not cover every activity performed in the public interest, but only those which are listed in that provision and described in great detail (Case C‑401/05 VDP Dental Laboratory [2006] ECR I‑12121, paragraph 24, and Horizon College , paragraph 14).

81. Une mesure telle que celle mise en cause par le recours de la Commission viole ainsi le principe de proportionnalité en ce que les exigences de la réglementation nationale en cause font double emploi avec les justifications et les garanties exigées dans l’État membre d’établissement. Or, le respect du principe de la libre prestation des services exige que l’État membre destinataire de la prestation tienne dûment compte des justifications et des garanties déjà présentées par le prestataire pour l’exercice de son activité dans l’État membre d’établissement (voir, notamment, arrêt du 17 décembre 1981, Webb, 279/80, Rec. p. 3305, point 20).