Judgment Approved by the court for handing down.
Davis & Ors v SSHD
to rule in every case where a question of interpretation
of Community law may arise.
He identified the matter which was of practical concern
to the Court of Justice, at paragraph 15:
“Any “application” of a rule of law can be regarded as
raising a question of “interpretation”—even if the
answer to the question of interpretation may seem
obvious. Every national court confronted with a dispute
turning on the application of Community law can refer a
question which, if more or less properly phrased, this
Court is bound to answer after the entire proceedings
have taken their course. That will be so even where the
question is similar in most respects to an earlier
question; the referring court (or the parties' lawyers)
may always seek to distinguish the facts of the cases. It
will be so even where the question could easily, and
with little scope for reasonable doubt, be answered on
the basis of existing case law; again the facts may be
different, or it may be that a particular condition
imposed in earlier case law gives rise to a new legal
argument and is regarded as needing further
clarification. The net result is that the Court could be
called upon to intervene in all cases turning on a point
of Community law in any court or tribunal in any of the
Member States. It is plain that if the Court were to be so
called upon it would collapse under its case-load.”
The solution is “a greater measure of self-restraint on
the part of both the national courts and the Court of
Justice”—see paragraph 18. Where the national court is
not a court of last resort, a reference will be most
appropriate where the question is one of general
importance and where the ruling is likely to promote the
uniform application of the law throughout the European
Union. A reference will be least appropriate where there
is an established body of case law which could readily
be transposed to the facts of the instant case...”
108.
A reference was refused in Trinity Mirror because, as Chadwick LJ put it at [55], “the
question of principle has been decided by the Court of Justice and a national court or
tribunal can now act in the light of that decision”.
109.
We take the same view in this case. The Claimants’ objections to a reference are well
founded for several reasons.
110.
Firstly, we are not the domestic court of last resort. We do not doubt that the questions
raised in this case are of general importance, but we do not consider that to refer the
present case to Luxembourg is likely to promote the uniform application of the law
throughout the EU: the CJEU has given general guidance already in Digital Rights