European Union – Public procurement. The Court of Justice of the European Union gave a preliminary ruling deciding that Parliament and Council Directive (EC) 2004/18 had to be interpreted as meaning that a contracting authority was not authorised to require, by a stipulation in the tender specifications of a public works contract, that the future contractor of that contract perform with its own resources a certain percentage of the works covered by that contract. Further, on the correct interpretation of Council Regulation (EC) 1083/2006, the fact that a contracting authority imposed a requirement, in the context of a public works contract relating to a project receiving EU financial aid, that the future contractor perform by means of its own resources at least 25% of those works, in infringement of the Directive, constituted an 'irregularity' which justified the need to apply a financial correction in so far as it could not be excluded that that infringement had had an impact on the budget of the fund at issue.