Request for preliminary ruling

Request for preliminary ruling (article 267 TFEU) (“question préjudicielle”)

National courts frequently deal with questions involving EU law. They may then face difficult questions of interpretation of the relevant EU law or even have doubts as to the validity of that legislation or a decision adopted under it. In order to have a uniform interpretation of EU law throughout the EU, the Treaty allows national courts to raise such questions to the Court of Justice. Such requests by a national court to the Court of Justice are the “requests for preliminary ruling “. With regard to DG Competition's activities, this may be for instance a question on the interpretation of a Block Exemption Regulation, or the powers of a NCA in applying EU antitrust law. On average, in the antitrust area, there are 5 to 10 preliminary ruling requests every year.

Resources

See Also

References

• Information about Request for preliminary ruling in the Antitrust Manual of Procedures for the application of Articles 101 and 102 TFEU (Internal DG Competition)

Further Reading

• Information about Request for preliminary ruling in EU Competition Procedure, 3rd. Edition, Edited by Luis Ortiz Blanco (Oxford University Press)