FONNSHIP A/S V SVENSKA TRANSPORTARBETAREFORBUNDET (THE "SAVA STAR")

Case C-83/13, Court of Justice of the European Union, 8 July 2014

Maritime transport - Freedom to provide services - Applicability to transport carried out from or to states that are parties to the Agreement on the European Economic Area (EEA) using vessels flying the flag of a third country - Industrial action taken in the ports of such a state in favour of third country nationals employed on those vessels - Nationality of those workers and vessels having no bearing on the applicability of EU law - of Council Regulation (EEC) No 4055/86 of 22 December 1986 applying the principle of freedom to provide services to maritime transport between member states and between member states and third countries

This was a request for a preliminary ruling under article 267 TFEU from the Arbetsdomstolen (Employment Tribunal, Sweden), made by decision of 14 February 2013, received at the court on 19 February 2013, in the proceedings between, on the one hand, F, a Norwegian shipping company, and on the other, ST, along with another transport workers trade union. The proceedings before the Employment Tribunal concerned industrial action taken against a vessel owned by F and flying the Panamanian flag. Claims had been submitted by both sides and were for damages resulting from the industrial action, which had prevented loading and unloading, and damages for breach of the Special Agreement signed as a result of the industrial action respectively. The shipowning company was registered in Norway, an EFTA state, and its vessel flagged in Panama, a non-EU state. A question as to the applicability of EU law and the freedom to provide services therefore arose before the Employment Tribunal, which referred a question as follows. "Is the rule in the EEA Agreement on free movement of services, maritime transport services - which rule has an equivalent in the EC Treaty - applicable to a company with its seat in an EFTA State [European Free Trade Association] as regards its activity in the form of transport services to an [European Community] Member State or an EFTA State using a vessel which is registered and flagged in another country outside the [European Community] and/or [the] EEA?"