Brussels, 01/07/2010 (Agence Europe) - The European Court of Justice, requested by the member states and different companies, made a ruling on 1 July on the different decisions by the Commission regarding legitimate or illegal state aid. It has therefore rejected the appeals: - by the Italian state and the three companies produced by the splitting up of the Terni company, against the Commission's decision in 2007 declaring that the preferential tariff on the supply of electricity to the three companies was illegal; - by French commercial TV channels TF1 and M6, which appealed against the decision of the Commission made in 2008 to authorise French state aid of €150 million to France Télévisions; - by banques BNP Paribas and BNL against the Commission's 2008 decision ordering recovery of the aid from the discriminatory tax system contained in the framework of the 1990 Amato law: therefore
- In Cases T-53/08, T-62/08 and T-64/08, the Italian Republic and ThyssenKrupp Acciai Speciali SpA, Cementir Italia Srl and Nuova Terni Industrie Chimiche SpA requested that the ECJ quash the decision made by the Commission in 2007, which ordered recovery of the operational aid, which had been illegally obtained by the preferential tariff on the supply of electricity. These preferential tariffs, together with other concessions, were granted in 1963 to the Terni company in compensation for expropriation during nationalisation of the electricity sector. The tariffs were then agreed to be given to the three companies mentioned above, which resulted from the split in Terni in 1964 and were legally extended until 2001 and 2010, without prior notification to the Commission. The Commission considered that they had been illegally obtained as operational aid from 2005 and it ordered the corresponding recovery of these amounts. The ECJ considered under Italian law, this preferential tariff was in no way linked to concessions agreed to Terni and that nothing would suggest that the legislator should align the duration of this tariff with that of the concessions. The extension agreed in 2005 therefore exceeded the compensation due for the expropriation in 1962 and the Commission decision was therefore based on this fact. The ECJ therefore rejected the appeal.
- In Case T-568/08 and Case T-573/08, the French commercial TV channels TF1 and Métropole télévision (M6), supported by Canal+, requested that the ECJ rule against the decision made by the Commission on 16 July 2007, which authorised state capital support of €150 million to France Télévisions, a public company and owner of French public service channels, to cover the costs of the public broadcasting service provided by this company. The aid had been decided following the announcement of getting rid of advertising and public television. The Commission considered that this amount of state aid was compatible with the treaty and, in its ruling, the ECJ confirmed this decision and also explained that the €150 million notified by the French state was exclusively used to cover the costs of a public broadcasting service and not to finance the advertising space for France Télévisions. This amount of aid was also much less than the costs for providing a public broadcasting service by the company, explained the Commission (€300 million in 2008: costs that were not financed because of the fall in advertising revenue and programming costs incurred by the forthcoming end to advertising on public channels). The ECJ therefore rejected the appeal by TF1 and M6.
Welcoming the ruling, the Commission pointed out that the Court had fully upheld its decision. It did say, however, that some issues raised by TF1 and M6 were relevant in the on-going formal investigation (see EUROPE 9967) on the long-term funding of France Télévisions. It will, therefore, carefully study the judgment to take account of the grounds for the Court's final decision on the funding mechanism notified within the framework of the reform of the public audio-visual sector in France, which comprises an annual subsidy to compensate the phasing out of adverts on public channels.
In case T-335/08, the General Court found for the Commission which, in its decision 2008/711/EC, took the view that the fiscal alignment regime put in place by the Italian state in 2003 contained state aid that was incompatible with the internal market and ordered recuperation from companies of monies paid out. The regime in question followed on from the Amato law of 1990 which, with the aim of rationalising the banking sector and allowing public banks to become limited companies, facilitated the transfer of assets from public banking bodies to private credit establishments, by suspending taxation on 85% of the capital gains on these assets. The Commission decided that this scheme benefited the companies to which assets were transferred in that it provided these companies with tax breaks not offered to other companies. The Court rejected the appeal by BNP Paribas, which effectively received state aid with its takeover of the Italian bank which had benefitted from the tax system at issue, and BNL SpA (Italy). The Court ruled that the Commission had not committed any errors and concluded that that there had been a selective economic advantage amounting to the difference between the tax paid under the system at issue and what would have been paid under the usual tax system. This selective character could not be justified by the logic of the Italian tax system, as the appellants had claimed. The appeal was, therefore, dismissed. (F.G./transl.rh.rt)