Keywords
Summary

Keywords

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1 . Approximation of laws - Procedures for the award of public works contracts - Directive 71/305 - Award of contracts - Abnormally low tenders - Automatic disqualification - Not permissible - Obligation to conduct an examination procedure - Tenders subject to examination - Obligations of national judicial and administrative authorities

( Council Directive 71/305/EEC, Art . 29(5 ) )

2 . Measures adopted by the institutions - Directives - Direct effect - Conditions - Implications

( EEC Treaty, Art . 189, third paragraph )

Summary

1 . Article 29(5 ) of Directive 71/305, from which Member States may not depart to any material extent when implementing it, prohibits the Member States from introducing provisions which require the automatic exclusion from procedures for the award of public works contracts of certain tenders determined according to a mathematical criterion, instead of obliging the awarding authority to apply the examination procedure laid down in the Directive, giving the tenderer an opportunity to furnish explanations .

Member States may require that tenders be examined when those tenders appear to be abnormally low, and not only when they are obviously abnormally low .

Administrative authorities, including municipal authorities, are under the same obligation as a national court to apply the provisions of Article 29(5 ) of the Directive and to refrain from applying provisions of national law which are inconsistent with them .

2 . Wherever the provisions of a directive appear, as far as their subject-matter is concerned, to be unconditional and sufficiently precise, those provisions may be relied upon by an individual against the State where that State has failed to implement the directive in national law by the end of the period prescribed or where it has failed to implement the directive correctly .

When the conditions under which individuals may rely on the provisions of a directive before the national courts are met, all organs of the administration, including decentralized authorities such as municipalities, are obliged to apply those provisions .