Keywords
Summary

Keywords

1. Preliminary rulings — Jurisdiction of the Court — Limits — Manifestly irrelevant questions and hypothetical questions in a context which precludes any useful answer — Questions not related to the purpose of the main proceedings — (Art. 234 EC)

2. Approximation of laws — Procedures for the award of public service contracts — Directive 92/50 — Contracting authorities — Body governed by public law — Definition — Company set up by a regional or local authority to promote the development of industrial or commercial activities on the territory of that authority — Included — Needs in the general interest, not having an industrial or commercial character — Assessment by the national courts — Criteria — (Council Directive 92/50, Art. 1(b), second para.)

Summary

1. In the context of the cooperation between the Court of Justice and the national courts provided for by Article 234 EC, it is solely for the national courts before which actions are brought, and which must bear the responsibility for the subsequent judicial decision, to determine in the light of the special features of each case both the need for a preliminary ruling in order to enable them to deliver judgment and the relevance of the questions which they submit to the Court. Consequently, since the questions referred involve the interpretation of Community law, the Court is, in principle, obliged to give a ruling.

Moreover, the Court can refuse to rule on a question referred for a preliminary ruling by a national court only where it is quite obvious that the interpretation of Community law that is sought bears no relation to the actual facts of the main action or its purpose, where the problem is hypothetical, or where the Court does not have before it the factual or legal material necessary to give a useful answer to the questions submitted to it.

see paras 19-20

2. A limited company established, owned and managed by a regional or local authority meets a need in the general interest, within the meaning of the second subparagraph of Article 1(b) of Directive 92/50 relating to the coordination of procedures for the award of public service contracts, where it acquires planning and construction services with a view to promoting the development of industrial or commercial activities on the territory of that regional or local authority by constructing premises to be leased to undertakings. Such activities are likely to give a stimulus to trade and the economic and social development of the local authority concerned, since the location of undertakings on the territory of a municipality often has favourable repercussions for that municipality in terms of creation of jobs, increase of tax revenue and improvement of the supply and demand of goods and services. To determine whether that need has no industrial or commercial character, the national court must assess the circumstances which prevailed when that company was set up and the conditions in which it carries on its activity, taking account in particular of the fact that it does not aim primarily at making a profit, the fact that it does not bear the risks associated with the activity, and any public financing of the activity in question.

The fact that the premises to be constructed are leased only to a single undertaking is not capable of calling into question the lessor's status of a body governed by public law, where it is shown that the lessor meets a need in the general interest not having an industrial or commercial character.

see paras 45, 59, 64, operative part