Consumer protection under EU law ‘is not absolute’: yes, but be careful!
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Stephen Weatherill
Abstract
The judgment of the Fifth Chamber of the Court in Ángel Lorenzo Gonz´lez Alonso v Nationale Nederlanden Vida Cia De Seguros y Reaseguros SAE does not concern startling subject matter, nor is the ruling a surprise. The Court concluded that the exclusion of insurance contracts from the scope of Directive 85/577 on doorstep selling was apt to cover unit-linked insurance contracts. The interest in the ruling lies in the Court's declaration for the third time in recent years that the protection of consumers pursued by the EU's rules is not absolute and is subject to certain limits. The purpose of this note is not to deny this nor to quarrel with the outcome of the Court's cases, but rather to caution that this approach should not be elevated to an interpretative principle apt to challenge the longstanding and constitutionally proper assumption that the EU's legislative acquis shall benefit from a pro-consumer interpretation. In particular it should be appreciated – as the Fifth Chamber appears not to appreciate – that this latest ruling is not of precisely the same type as earlier rulings in which the Court has referred to the limits of consumer protection under EU law.
Articles in the same Issue
- Masthead
- Defects in Consent: An Assessment of Chapter Five of the Proposal for a Common European Sales Law
- The Consumer Rights Directive – An Assessment of its Contribution to the Development of European Consumer Contract Law
- Bargaining in the shadow of free movement of capital
- European Community legislation and Actions
- The Position of the German Bundestag on the Commission's Proposal for a Regulation on a Common European Sales Law
- European Union Litigation
- Consumer protection under EU law ‘is not absolute’: yes, but be careful!
- European Private Law – Current Status and perspectives Reiner Schulze & Hans Schulte-Nölke (eds) Sellier European Law Publishers, 2011
- The Foundations of European Private Law, edited by R. Brownsword, H.-W. Micklitz, L. Niglia and S. Weatherill (Oxford and Portland: Hart Publishing, 2011) XXXVII–609
Articles in the same Issue
- Masthead
- Defects in Consent: An Assessment of Chapter Five of the Proposal for a Common European Sales Law
- The Consumer Rights Directive – An Assessment of its Contribution to the Development of European Consumer Contract Law
- Bargaining in the shadow of free movement of capital
- European Community legislation and Actions
- The Position of the German Bundestag on the Commission's Proposal for a Regulation on a Common European Sales Law
- European Union Litigation
- Consumer protection under EU law ‘is not absolute’: yes, but be careful!
- European Private Law – Current Status and perspectives Reiner Schulze & Hans Schulte-Nölke (eds) Sellier European Law Publishers, 2011
- The Foundations of European Private Law, edited by R. Brownsword, H.-W. Micklitz, L. Niglia and S. Weatherill (Oxford and Portland: Hart Publishing, 2011) XXXVII–609
