CILFIT Criteria for the Acte Clair/Acte Éclairé Doctrine in Direct Tax Cases of the CJEU

Abstract:

In the Da Costa and CILFIT decisions, the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) developed what is known as the acte éclairé and the acte clair doctrine which sets the criteria when the national courts are not obliged to make a preliminary reference to the CJEU about the matter of interpretation of EU law. These criteria were often criticized in the literature, especially their application in the field of direct taxes. This article represents a critical overview of this doctrine and proposes a new criterion for the classification of preliminary questions primarily concerning direct taxation.