Case 33/74 van Binsbergen [1974] ECR 1299

• A Dutch law said that for a lawyer to represent someone in the Dutch courts it was necessary for the lawyer to be resident in the Netherlands.

• Plaintiff challenged this as being contrary to Article 49 EC (freedom to provide services by a person/undertaking in one MS to a consumer in another shall not be prohibited).

• ECJ held that a requirement of ‘habitual residence’ was such a restriction, and that since Article 49 (and 50) were directly effective, they could be relied on before the national courts. 

ECJ

• A requirement of residence in the MS concerned may deprive Article 49 of its whole purpose (namely the free provision of services across borders).

• However the court acknowledged that:

A Member State cannot be denied the right to take measures to prevent the exercise by a person providing services whose activity is entirely or principally directed towards its territory […] for the purpose of avoiding the professional rules of conduct which would be applicable to him if he were established within that State

• Control of a professional activity could, however, be easily satisfied by having an address in the country concerned.