Type: Judgment

Authority: European Authorities: Euopean Union' Court of Justice

Date: 07/11/2013

Subject: According to the Court, Directive 2006/123/EC on services in the internal market must be interpreted as meaning that the exclusion of healthcare services from the scope of that directive covers any activity intended to assess, maintain or restore the state of health of patients, where that activity is carried out by healthcare professionals recognised as such by the Member State concerned, regardless of the ways in which the facilities in which that care is provided are organised and financed or whether they are public or private. The same conclusion has to be drawn for the social services. Their exclusion from the scope of that directive includes any activity relating, inter alia, to the care and assistance of elderly persons, where that activity is carried out by a private service provider which has been mandated by the State by means of an act conferring, in a clear and transparent manner, a genuine obligation to provide such services under specific conditions. It is for the national court to ascertain whether day-care centres and night-care centres are excluded from the scope of that directive, having regard to the nature of the activities carried out by the healthcare professionals and having regard to the nature of the principle activities of care and assistance of elderly persons carried out in those centres.

Parties: Femarbel

Classification: Freedoms - Art. 15 Freedom to provide services - Solidarity - Art. 34 Social security

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