Brussels, 17/01/2014 (Agence Europe) - In the context of recovery of a penalty payment set by the European Court of Justice, the Commission cannot rule on the conformity with EU law of national legislation which the Court of Justice has not examined beforehand, as this would encroach on the exclusive jurisdiction reserved to the Court of Justice.
In a ruling issued on 15 January, the European Court of Justice upholds the General Court ruling of 29 March 2011 (see EUROPE 10347), disagreeing with the European Commission, which had appealed against the General Court's ruling. At issue is a law introduced by Portugal (Law 67/2007) annulling Portuguese legislation that the Court of Justice ruled unlawful in 2004 in case C-275/03. The law, introduced just before a second Court of Justice ruling, issued on 10 January 2008 in case C-70/06, levying a daily fine on Portugal of €19,392 until it complied with the 2004 ruling, was felt by the Commission to fail to comply with the ruling on the recovery of a fine. The Commission therefore set a daily fine itself, to apply until 17 July 2008, when the new law came into force (Law 31/2008), which Portugal introduced to correct the problems with Law 67/2007. Portugal took the matter to court and the General Court annulled the Commission decision, saying that the Commission did not have powers to decide that Law 67/2007 did not comply with EU law and therefore was not entitled to change the fine levied by the Court of Justice. Instead, it should have issued a new court case for failure to comply.
The Court of Justice upheld the General Court's ruling that the Commission's judgment about implementation of a Court of Justice ruling must not damage the Court's exclusive powers to decide on whether national legislation complies with EU law. Allowing the Commission a greater margin of discretion would lead to a breach of the procedural rights of defence available to the member states in infringement proceedings. The General Court also cannot itself give a ruling on the Commission's assessment as to whether compliance with a judgment establishing a failure to fulfil obligations can be achieved through a national practice or national legislation which has not previously been examined by the Court of Justice, because this would also infringe the Court of Justice's exclusive powers. (F.G./transl.fl)