Title:
Commission of the European Communities v. Kingdom of Spain
Party:
European Union
Region:
Europe
Europe
Type of document:
International court
Date of text:
December 15, 2005
Data source:
InforMEA
Court name:
European Court of Justice
Seat of court:
Luxembourg
Justice(s):
Jann, P.
Schiemann, K.
Colneric, N.
Cunha Rodrigues, J., N.
Levits, E.
Reference number:
C-26/04
Abstract:
By its application the Commission of the European Communities requested the Court to declare that, by failing to officially designate three beaches, located in Comunidad Autónoma de Galicia, as bathing areas and, by failing to adopt a pollution reduction programme for the Ría de Vigo, the Kingdom of Spain has failed to fulfill its obligations under Article 4(1) of Council Directive 76/160/EEC of 8 December 1975 concerning the quality of bathing water and Article 5 of Council Directive 79/923/EEC of 30 October 1979 on the quality required of shellfish waters.
Concerning the first complaint the court held that Article 4(1) of Directive 76/160 did not expressly impose the obligation on Member States to officially designate beaches or other places as bathing areas. On the contrary, Article 1(2)(a) of that directive defined bathing waters as being those in which bathing was either explicitly authorized by the competent authorities of each Member State or was not prohibited and was traditionally practiced by a large number of bathers. It followed from the second part of that definition that it was permissible for Member States to allow bathing in certain waters without necessarily designating them as bathing areas.
The absence in Directive 76/160 of an obligation to officially designate the relevant waters was emphasized by the fact that other directives relating to the protection of the environment and public health did contain an express provision requiring Member States to officially designate or identify certain areas or waters. Consequently, the first claim was dismissed.
The second claim concerned the infringement of Article 5 of Directive 79/923. It was common ground between the parties that the waters of the Ría de Vigo had been designated by the Kingdom of Spain as shellfish waters in accordance with Article 4 of Directive 79/923.
In its defense, the Kingdom of Spain maintained that the scope of that directive, defined in Article 1, was limited to waters where shellfish which were ‘directly edible by man’ lived. The directive had a single objective: to improve of the quality of waters used for the cultivation of shellfish directly edible by man. According to the Kingdom of Spain, no area of the Ría de Vigo was an area producing shellfish intended for direct human consumption. The Ría de Vigo produced only shellfish which underwent purification treatment, or re-laying in beds, prior to consumption. Consequently, there was no infringement of Article 5 of Directive 79/923.
The court did not accept this argument. Article 1 of Directive 79/923 provided that it applied to those coastal and brackish waters designated by the Member States as needing protection or improvement in order to support shellfish life ‘and thus to contribute to the high quality of shellfish products directly edible by man’. The phrase ‘and thus to contribute to the high quality of shellfish products directly edible by man’ did not limit the scope of the directive to that aim, but rather indicated that it simultaneously pursued a further objective which could be achieved by the same means, the use of the adverb ‘thus’ being significant in this respect. It followed from that wording that the directive applied to all shellfish waters, whether the shellfish living in them were intended for direct human consumption or for consumption after treatment.
Accordingly, the Commission’s second claim was regarded as well founded. Consequently, it was held that, by failing to adopt a pollution reduction programme for the shellfish waters of the Ría de Vigo, the Kingdom of Spain failed to fulfill its obligations under Article 5 of Directive 79/923.