The Good Lobby, a civic start-up representing hundreds of legal experts and more than a million lawyers in Europe, announced, on Wednesday 14 April, that it had sent a letter to the Presidents of the European Commission, the European Council and the European Parliament on the same day urging the European Union to stop violating international law on access to justice in environmental matters.
They say that the proposal to amend the EU regulation transposing the Aarhus Convention (EC No 1367/2006), on which the EU Council reached political agreement in December 2020 (see EUROPE 12625/2), does not go far enough to comply with international law.
They therefore urge the three institutions to “fully implement the findings and recent advice of the ACCC” - the Convention’s Compliance Committee, which had published its opinion on 12 February.
According to these lawyers, the Commission, the Parliament and the Eu Council must ensure three things:
- ensure that all binding administrative decisions taken by the EU institutions are subject to review, including those requiring “implementing measures” at national level;
- guarantee that State Aid decisions that infringe EU environmental law are subject to scrutiny;
- allow individuals and NGOs to challenge illegal EU decisions.
The Opinion of the Legal Service of the Council of the EU has not yet been delivered. The Portuguese Presidency of the EU Council is ready to open negotiations with the Parliament once it has taken a decision.
The European Parliament’s Committee on Environment will vote on 22 April on a draft report by Christian Doleschal (EPP, Germany) which calls for the case law of the European Court of Justice to be taken into account. The plenary vote is scheduled for May.
See the draft parliamentary report: https://bit.ly/2Qqf9i8
See the ACCC’s opinion: https://bit.ly/3tmio8E (Original version in French by Aminata Niang)