The Enforcement of Eu Law

To answer this question I will firstly explain how EU law became incorporated within the member states I will then explain the various types of EU legislation's in circulation. This is important to define as the various types of methods will involve different enforcement procedures. Finally I will explain how EU law is enforced and the ways EU law will effect the member state and individual businesses. I will summarise my findings at the end of the essay, this will give details of all the key ideas I have ut across.

The Schuman proposal began various European countries setting up the European Coal and Steal Community (ECSC), this was signed in 1951 by six countries. The countries that initially set up the ECSC were France, Germany, Italy, Luxembourg, Belgium and the Netherlands. The idea behind the ECSC was the first serious institutional committee in Europe and was the start of integration, the aim was to provide a common market of coal and steel trade. This meant that each of the states would be able to have access to the various qualities of coal and steel that the members had with no tariff of importing and exporting to the various countries. This let the countries concentrate on their more efficient areas leading to specialisation. The ECSC began the beginning of supranational power because the "High Authority could adopt binding decisions" (1) as elements of decision making were carried out by ECSC committees. A supranational power is where the member state has to abide by the decisions made of the community, as they have power above the national level.

When the EC makes a law it is up to the individual state to implement the legislation. An example of EU law which has been passed which has been adopted in the UK is that of the directive 75/117 which states that men and women should receive equal pay. The UK government adopted this directive with the 1975 Sex discrimination Act.

There are a number of methods EU legislation is formed for instance regulations, directives and decisions are three different types of EU legislation. I am going to briefly explain these three as the way they will be enforced are different.

Regulations have general application that means that all the member states have to adopt the regulation; the member state is expected to adopt the whole regulation. Regulations are directly applicable which means that the "individuals have rights that they can enforce in their own name through national courts"(2). Regulations have immediate effect in national law.

Directives are binding to the member state that the directive is about. The EU will give an outline of the directive and will let the member state enforce the directive in the way they see fit. The member state may have a similar law already in its national law and therefore only has to introduce the segments of the directives and create new laws which are not written in national law. This allows the member states to react to legislation in accordance to the way countries would be carried out.

Decisions are totally binding to whomever the decision has been made against. This normally occurs in the European Court of Justice (ECJ) when member states are being investigated the conclusions of the ECJ will come in the form of decisions whereby the member state will have to follow the decision when it is made. The decision becomes effected when the decision has been made.

Community law has supremacy over the national law as it was a condition that had to be agreed before membership of the European union. Supremacy is whereby the European Community law will take superiority if there is a dispute between national and EU law. It is up to the state to adopt the EU legislation, if the member state is seen not to be enforcing the law then there are various methods for the EU law to be enforced.

Enforcement takes two approaches which EU law enforcement occurs firstly the commission who has been given certain powers under the EC treaty looks at the member states and companies and makes sure that the EC law is being enforced and if not then the commission follows various procedures to enforce the law. Secondarily enforcement can occur with the use of direct and indirect effect. These are two different processes of enforcement that I will now go onto explain.

In Article 211 the commission roles of enforcement are stated; within this article the commission has to ensure that there is "proper functioning and development of the common market"(7). The commission if they see that a member state is in breech of European community law then the commission will follow certain procedures. Firstly the commission will discover that the member state they are in breach of their obligation and will inform the state about. The commission can be known as "the guardian of the treaty" (3) this means that once the proposals have been introduced the commission is the body that will insure implementation by the member states. Article 169 from the EC treaty it states that the commission is responsible for monitoring "the manner in which the member states meet their obligations under community law." (4)

In the case of the Commission versus Italy (1973), the commission saw that a series of regulations that were introduced concerning "premiums for slaughtering cows and withholding milk products from the market." (5) The commission concluded that Italy was not following the regulations which the community law stated therefore brought Infringement proceedings towards Italy as the commission saw that the member state was "in breech of community law" (6)

When the European community law creates a directive, it will also set a period of time in which the directive will have to be implemented in the member states national courts. If the state does not comply then article 226 will become inforced.

Article 226 states that if the commission considers the member states has failed to implement community law then the commission will follow a four stage procedure, firstly the pre-contentious stage this is where the commission will give the state the chance to explain the reasoning for not implementing, if the state still does not enforce the EU law with this informal measure then the commission will go to the second stage which is formal notification. This is where the commission will inform the offending state and give them a time frame where the European law should be enforced. If the Member state still does not enforce the law then the commission will use the third stage which is reasoned opinion. This is where the commission will restate the EU law that has to be enforced and will give a final deadline for the state