When Can a Reference for a Preliminary Ruling be Made?

Abstract

Chapter 5 discusses the requirement that an answer to the preliminary question must be relevant for the resolution of the main proceedings. It analyses when a preliminary ruling must be assumed to be irrelevant to the decision in the main proceedings, and it discusses the so-called Foglia principle according to which the Court declines jurisdiction to reply to questions of interpretation which are submitted to it within the framework of a contrived case. Chapter 5 also examines when a preliminary reference is precluded because the same issue is, has been, or could be subject to a direct action before the Court of Justice. Here it first examines the relationship between, on the one hand, the preliminary procedure and, on the other hand, Articles 258 and 259 TFEU concerning infringement proceedings. Next, it analyses the relationship between the preliminary procedure and Article 263 TFEU concerning actions for annulment before the Court of Justice (TWD-doctrine).