EU Enforcement Policy of Community Environmental law as presented in the Commission Communication on implementing European Community Environmental law

elni Review ◽  
2009 ◽  
pp. 54-62
Author(s):  
Marta Ballesteros
Keyword(s):  
European Commission ◽  
European Community ◽  
Environmental Law ◽  
Round Table ◽  
Strategic Decision ◽  
Legal Service ◽  
Discussion Paper ◽  
Member States ◽  
Enforcement Policy ◽  
Commission Staff Working Document

On 18 November 2008, the European Commission issued a Communication on Implementing European Community Environmental Law. It was accompanied by a more detailed Commission Staff Working Document. The current paper is a ClientEarth legal assessment of the enforcement and implementation policy for Community Environmental law as proposed by the Commission in this Communication. The Communication reflects the extremely good work that the legal unit in DG Environment has been undertaking for years now in the implementation of enforcement actions. It also represents a new step in establishing a coherent enforcement policy for European Community environmental law in response to new challenges. However, the Communication and the underlying enforcement policy described are incomplete and are not sufficient for achieving overall compliance with Community environmental law in Member States. On first view, the Commission’s proposals seem to constitute efforts to tackle the problem of insufficient resources so that they can be used more efficiently and greater compliance can be achieved with Community environmental law. However, it might also signal the Commission’s unstated plan, or even a strategic decision, to retreat from enforcement activities and rely more heavily on Member States to enforce Community environmental law. Any such retreat would be a derogation of the Commission’s obligations under Art. 211 of the Treaty. This article is based on a ClientEarth discussion paper presented at a round table organised by Ecosphere on the 8th of July 2009 and takes into account the information and ideas exchanged in the debate. Representatives from different services of the European Commission including the legal unit of DG Environment, and the Legal Service, as well as from consultancies, think tanks and Environmental NGOs attended the meeting.

The Competition Policy of the European Community: a Conference Report

1983 ◽  
Vol 18 (3) ◽  
pp. 267-290
Author(s):  
Rebecca Smellie
Keyword(s):  
European Commission ◽  
European Community ◽  
Competition Policy ◽  
Conference Report ◽  
Common Market ◽  
Member States ◽  
Specific Instance ◽  
The World

IN A FIERCELY CONTESTED GAME OF FOOTBALL OR RUGBY THE job of the referee is both essential and unenviable. On such occasions, whilst the players will appreciate the importance of the rules of the competition, the incentive to break them can be overwhelming. This is a specific instance of a more general case: the higher the stakes in any competition, the greater the need for a good referee to ensure that the game is played fairly.Much more significant competition takes place between the industries of the member states of the European Community, and indeed of the rest of the world, for the custom of the Community's markets. It is important to note that the European Community is still far from achieving a truly common market across all the member states, as free from non-tariff barriers as it is already from tariffs. Competition policy in Europe has two referees, national enforcement bodies and the European Commission. This paper is concerned only with the Commission, which has responsibility for matters of competition between the member states.

Enforcement of European environmental law - The European Parliament comments on the Commission’s report

elni Review ◽  
2008 ◽  
pp. 81-85
Author(s):  
Sebastian Tusch
Keyword(s):  
European Union ◽  
European Community ◽  
Annual Report ◽  
Environmental Law ◽  
European Parliament ◽  
The European Union ◽  
Member States ◽  
Community Law ◽  
Structural Problems ◽  
European Community Law

The European Commission publishes a yearly “Report on the Monitoring of the Application of Community Law in the Member States of the European Union”. The 2005 edition was reviewed by a member of the Parliament, namely Monica Frassoni, from Italy (Greens/EFA-IT). Her report has recently been adopted by a noteworthy resolution of the European Parliament. The resolution points out both the structural problems of enforcing European Community law and the disputable approach of the Commission during the last few years. The European Parliament recognises that European Community law is not being applied consistently. The Members of the European Parliament (MEPs) refer to the annual report of the Commission in which the infringement proceedings initiated by the Commission are listed. This report illustrates that the number of detected infringements decreased from 2709 (in 2003) to 2653 (in 2005). This drop by 56 infringements seems at first sight not to be significant. But this reported decrease of procedures happened despite the fact that the European Union increased the number of Member States from 15 to 25 in 2004. Against this background, the lower level in 2005 is indeed questionable. Basically, the enlargement of the European Union was expected to cause a significant increase of infringement procedures against the Member States. This applies in particular to new Member States whose legal systems had been – in terms of compliance with European law – divergent from those in the other Member States.

Application of European Environmental Law by National Courts

elni Review ◽  
2008 ◽  
pp. 78-80
Author(s):  
Luc Lavrysen
Keyword(s):  
European Commission ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
Environmental Law ◽  
National Level ◽  
Training Programme ◽  
Member States ◽  
National Courts ◽  
Set Up

In this article, the author describes the situation of National Courts applying European Environmental Law. The article shows that not in all Member States the issue is being addressed as it should be. Therefore, the author strongly supports the initiative taken by the European Commission to set up, in the light of Communication COM(2007)502 of September 2007, a large-scale training programme for members of the judiciary on the national level.

EU Dieselgate: unveiling the weirdness of the EU’s attitude to compliance on environmental matters

elni Review ◽  
2018 ◽  
pp. 52-59
Author(s):  
Delphine Misonne
Keyword(s):  
Operating System ◽  
European Union ◽  
European Commission ◽  
Environmental Law ◽  
The European Union ◽  
Direct Power ◽  
Member States ◽  
European Environmental Agency ◽  
Android Operating System ◽  
Environmental Agency

“Google fined €4.34bn by EU over Android antitrust violations”. June 2018: the European Commission imposes a record penalty, after a 39-month investigation into Google’s Android operating system. This worldwide level news confirms the power of the European Union and its Commission in relation to competition and antitrust issues: a direct power to investigate and a power to sanction. By contrast, European environmental law looks like a ‘parent pauvre’. In this area, the European Commission does not enjoy a similar centralized investigative power, not even a faint shadow of it. No European Union institution or agency has such power in environmental matters, not even the European Environmental Agency. While the Commission’s role is to ensure the full application of Community legislation on the environment, enforcement of environmental law is and has always been primarily a responsibility of the Member States. The present paper wants to address the question whether the current inspection landscape, as applicable in the European Union and as far as environmental matters (and emissions into the environment in particular) are concerned, could have taken hold of what is now called ‘dieselgate’ and if both aspects (dieselgate and inspection) are, somehow, interrelated.

Access to the transposition of EU environmental law by Member States: Only if no infringement proceedings initiated

elni Review ◽  
2015 ◽  
pp. 24-29
Author(s):  
Anaïs Berthier
Keyword(s):  
Public Health ◽  
European Commission ◽  
Environmental Law ◽  
Legal Reasoning ◽  
Case Law ◽  
Member States ◽  
General Consensus ◽  
Court Of Justice ◽  
Aarhus Convention ◽  
The Eu

Ensuring a better implementation and enforcement of EU environmental law by Member States is one of the well-established commitments of the European Commission. One reason for this is the general consensus about the fact that the non-implementation of environmental law has huge repercussions, not only on the environment itself but on public health as well as the economy. However, Case C-612/13P shows that the way in which the Commission approaches this commitment is in contradiction with its goal. This article analyses the ruling of the Court of Justice and addresses the legal reasoning behind the refusal from the EU courts to apply the Aarhus Convention to EU institutions. Furthermore, the article elaborates on the concept of investigation under Article 4(2). It also deals with the Regulation 1049/2001 and the limits the Court placed on the presumption of confidentiality established by previous case-law for documents pertaining to administrative files.

A Social Enterprise Company in EU Organisational Law?

2021 ◽  
pp. 1-35
Author(s):  
J S LIPTRAP
Keyword(s):  
European Integration ◽  
European Commission ◽  
Social Enterprise ◽  
Social Economy ◽  
Member States ◽  
Regulatory Issues ◽  
Cross Border ◽  
The Social ◽  
Proposal A

Abstract This article explores the European Parliament's July 2018 non-legislative resolution proposing to the European Commission a directive for facilitating social enterprise companies’ cross-border activities. The proposal is first situated within the context of the social economy and how the sector has grown in importance to European integration. The proposal and the European Commission's response are then examined. Although the European Commission was not convinced that Member States would be amenable to the proposal, a consensus may already exist that is sufficient to garner their support. Even if this prediction is wrong, however, it is argued that there are reasons to surmise that the proposal will likely be reassessed and ultimately successful at some future point. Finally, the proposal is viewed with a reflexive harmonisation lens. Through the analysis, regulatory issues are identified, and a solution is then suggested.

scholarly journals Member States’ social security agreements with India

2018 ◽  
Vol 20 (2) ◽  
pp. 173-187
Author(s):  
Pauline Melin
Keyword(s):  
Social Security ◽  
European Commission ◽  
Current Approach ◽  
Legal Analysis ◽  
The European Union ◽  
Member States ◽  
Bilateral Agreements ◽  
Country Case Study ◽  
The Eu

In a 2012 Communication, the European Commission described the current approach to social security coordination with third countries as ‘patchy’. The European Commission proposed to address that patchiness by developing a common EU approach to social security coordination with third countries whereby the Member States would cooperate more with each other when concluding bilateral agreements with third countries. This article aims to explore the policy agenda of the European Commission in that field by conducting a comparative legal analysis of the Member States’ bilateral agreements with India. The idea behind the comparative legal analysis is to determine whether (1) there are common grounds between the Member States’ approaches, and (2) based on these common grounds, it is possible to suggest a common EU approach. India is taken as a third-country case study due to its labour migration and investment potential for the European Union. In addition, there are currently 12 Member State bilateral agreements with India and no instrument at the EU level on social security coordination with India. Therefore, there is a potential need for a common EU approach to social security coordination with India. Based on the comparative legal analysis of the Member States’ bilateral agreements with India, this article ends by outlining the content of a potential future common EU approach.

Regional Policy in the European Community: Its Impact on Regional Policies and Public Administration in the Mediterranean Member States

1987 ◽  
Vol 5 (3) ◽  
pp. 369-381 ◽  
Author(s):  
I Tömmel
Keyword(s):  
Regional Development ◽  
European Community ◽  
Regional Policy ◽  
National Level ◽  
State Intervention ◽  
Economic Incentive ◽  
Market Mechanism ◽  
Member States ◽  
Regional Policies ◽  
First Time

When the European Community (EC) created the European Fund for Regional Development (EFRD) in 1975, regional policy was established at an international level for the first time ever. Because of the chosen instruments and the ‘additive’ mechanism of implementation—via the administrative bodies of the member states—this policy seemed at first to mean little more than a reinforcement of regional policies at a national level. Since then, the EC has considerably intensified its regional policy and diversified its instruments. However, the recent reforms of the Community's regional policy serve not only to achieve (certain) development effects with respect to the economic structure of less-developed areas, but also as a means of reorganizing governmental (planning) bodies and regional development policies in the member states, that is, as a means of inducing modernization and differentiation of state intervention in the countries concerned. Thus, the EC intervenes’ in the affairs of the member states: Not in the shape of more or less authoritarian intervention by a superior body—EC powers do not permit this—but via the indirect effect of market mechanism. Subsidies are the economic incentive to collaborate.

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