On 6 October 2015, the Court of Justice of the European Union (“the Court” or “ECJ”) gave out its judgment in Case C-23/14 Post Danmark II on rebates. The judgment constitutes a recapitulation and systematisation of the Court’s previous case-law on this subject and it provides guidance to public enforcers as well as to dominant undertakings when designing their rebate schemes.
The judgment in Case C-67/14 Alimanovic came out on 15 September 2015. This case raises similar questions with Case C-333/13 Dano (blogged here). The Court of Justice (“CoJ”) made here another clarification regarding entitlement to “social assistance” under (the Citizenship) Directive 2004/38.
The Court of Justice (“the Court”) delivered its judgment on appeal in Case C-583/13 P Deutsche Bahn AG a.o. v European Commission, which deals with three important issues concerning the Commission’s powers of inspection in competition cases. These three issues, as defined by DB’s three pleas on appeal, refer to, first, the interpretation and application of the fundamental right to the inviolability of the home provided for in Articles 7 of the Chapter and Article 8 of the ECHR; second, the interpretation and application of the right to effective judicial protection provided for in Article 47 of the Chapter and Article 6(1) of the ECHR; and third, the rights of defence due to alleged irregularities vitiating the conduct of the first inspection.
In this post, we will look closer into the third issue, i.e. the required scope of the Commission’s inspection decisions. Continue reading
On February 12, 2015, the Court of Justice (“CoJ”) gave its judgment in the Finnish preliminary reference case C-396/13 Sähköalojen ammattiliitto concerning issues on the posting of workers.
Certain Member States were concerned about the so-called “welfare tourism”, i.e. the possibility of nationals of another Member State to enter their territory “solely” in order to claim benefits. Yesterday’s judgment in Case C-333/13 Dano comes to relieve those concerns.
In short the facts of the case can be summarised as follows. Ms Dano and her son, Romanian nationals, entered Germany and live in the city of Leipzig. Ms Dano receives child benefit for her son as well as another allowance paid out for a children, whose father’s identity is unknown (in total 317 Euro). In the background to the case, there is nothing to indicate that she has looked for a job in Germany. The case in the main proceedings was initiated when Ms Dano’s application for the grant of benefits by way of basic provision for jobseekers was rejected by the German administration (the child’s benefits are not at issue).
This judgment concerns the payment of a special tax (and its repayment by the Member State concerned) imposed upon the first registration of a motor vehicle in Romania. Initially this tax was introduced as a motor vehicle pollution tax by an order of 2008 (‘the 2008 Order’) and it was later replaced by the environmental stamp duty by an order of 2013 (‘the 2013 Order’) following the judgments in Case C-402/09Tatu (EU:C:2011:219) and Case C-263/10 Nisipeanu (EU:C:2011:466) which found such pollution tax to be contrary to EU law.
The EFTA Court delivered last Friday its judgment in Case E-28/13 LBI hf. v Merrill Lynch International Ltd, a request for an advisory opinion case referred by the District Court of Reykjavik. This case is the last in a series of cases before the EFTA Court and the Court of Justice concerning the interpretation of Directive 2001/24 on the winding-up of credit institutions where an Icelandic financial institution was involved (see judgments in Case E-18/11 Irish Bank and Case C-85/12 Landsbanki). Xavier and I were the agents for the EFTA Surveillance Authority in all three cases. But let’s now come to the recent judgment:
The EFTA Court delivered its judgment in Case E-21/13 FIFA v EFTA Surveillance Authority on 3 October 2014. As I was the agent for the defendant in that case, I wanted to publish a post to it, even though it is… no big news as the EFTA Court reiterates the case-law of the Court of Justice (“CoJ”).
Background to the case/Contested decision:
In that case, FIFA challenged a decision by the EFTA Surveillance Authority (“the Authority”), in which the latter approved the inclusion in the Norwegian list of events of all the matches played at the final stage of the FIFA World Cup.
The Court of Justice (“CoJ”) gave last week its judgment in Case C- 67/13 P Groupement des cartes bancaires (“CB”) v European Commission.
This post will focus of the issue of judicial review without going about a detailed presentation of the points relevant to a “by object” restriction and the application of Article 101(1) TFEU. Such presentation might follow in a later post.
Case C-184/13 concerns the compatibility with EU law, and in particular with Article 101 TFEU, of national legislation pursuant to which the price of road haulage services for hire and reward cannot be lower than the minimum operating costs. These costs are fixed primarily in the framework of voluntary sectoral agreements concluded by professional associations of carriers and customers, or in the absence of such agreements by the Osservatorio (a national body in Italy carrying out, inter alia, monitoring tasks concerning compliance with the provisions on road safety and social security and updating the practices and customs applicable to haulage contracts concluded orally), and if not by the latter, directly by the Ministry of Infrastructure and Transport.
EU litigation 