Brussels, 15/01/2013 (Agence Europe) - Business secrecy cannot be used as a pretext for refusing public access regarding urban planning decisions on buildings that have a significant environmental impact, according to a ruling by the European Court of Justice (ECJ) on Tuesday 15 January (case C-416/10). The court was responding to a question put by the Slovakian Supreme Court in a case where the Slovakian authorities had authorised the construction and use of a dump without having previously published the urban planning decision, despite a request by the inhabitants of the town of Pezinok, close to where the dump was to be built. The Slovakian court requested clarification on the scope of the public law on participation in project authorisation procedures when they have a significant environmental impact and involve access to information in this connection.
In its ruling, the ECJ decided that the refusal to provide the public with information about the urban planning decision could not be justified by invoking a right to protecting the confidentiality of commercial or industrial information. The urban planning decision, which is the basis of the decision to provide authorisation or not for the dump in question, contains all the relevant information to which the public concerned should be able to have access under the Aahrus Convention (information, public participation in decision-making processes and legal aid in environmental cases) and the 96/61/EC directive (pollution prevention and reduction). This information should be available at an early stage (in this case, during the first administrative procedures) if it is available. However, the unjustified refusal to provide information about the urban planning decision during the initial administrative procedure can be rectified during the second part of the administrative procedures, on the condition that all options and solutions remain possible and that such rectification would allow the public to exert genuine influence on the result of the decision making process. The ECJ also considers that, when a plant has benefited from an authorisation granted in violation of the directive on the prevention and reduction of pollution, members of the public concerned should be able to request the adoption of provisional measures, such as the temporary suspension of the contested authorisation. In this connection, it points out that the decision of the national judge to annul such authorisation is unlikely, as it stands, and could constitute an unjustified breach of rights of the party operating the dump. (FG/transl.fl)