Judgment — ECLI:EU:C:2000:644
Date: 2000-11-23
Language of the case: English
Court formation: Sixth Chamber
Based on: Treaty establishing the European Coal and Steel Community (1951)
Subject matter: State aids;Competition
Concepts: Investments and financial aid;Principle of the protection of legitimate expectations
Procedure: Action for annulment;Appeal - unfounded
Origin: United Kingdom

Summary of the Judgment 
1. ECSC — Steel aid — Commission authorisation — General decisions and individual 
decisions — Adoption of individual decisions to authorise aid not coming under any of 
the categories of aid authorised by a general decision — Competence 
(ECSC Treaty, Arts 4(c) and 95; Decision No 3855/91, Art. 1(1» 
I - 10349 
SUMMARY — CASE C-1/98 P 
2. ECSC — Steel aid — Commission authorisation — General decisions and individual 
decisions — Protection of legitimate expectations arising under the Fifth Code as to 
the possibility of derogation from that Code — No legitimate expectation 
(ECSC Treaty, Art. 95; Decision No 3855/91) 
1. Article 1 ( 1 ) of the Fifth Steel Aid Code 
contains no general prohibition of aid 
but simply defines in general terms the 
scope of the derogation provided for in 
Article 4(c) of the ECSC Treaty. 
Accordingly, that provision of the Code 
is not intended to exclude the adoption 
of other measures derogating from the 
prohibition laid down in Article 4(c) of 
the ECSC Treaty. 
Moreover, Article 1(1) of the Code 
must be interpreted as meaning that 
the Commission is not competent, 
under the Code, to approve, in accor­
dance with the simplified procedures 
introduced by the latter, aid not cov­
ered by Articles 2 to 5 of the Code, and 
that, on the contrary, it is competent to 
adopt, pursuant to Article 95 of the 
ECSC Treaty, with the unanimous 
assent of the Council, supplementary 
measures, whether general or indivi­
dual, approving aid not covered by the 
Fifth Aid Code. 
Consequently, the Court of First 
Instance was right to hold, first, that 
the Fifth Aid Code represented a bind­
ing legal framework only for aid com­
patible with the ECSC Treaty and 
enumerated by it and, second, that the 
Commission is empowered to have 
recourse to Article 95 of the ECSC 
Treaty in order to adopt individual 
decisions. 
(see paras 30, 34, 43) 
2. After finding that the Fifth Aid Code 
did not pursue the same purpose as the 
Commission decisions adopted to deal 
with an exceptional situation, the 
Court of First Instance was right to 
infer that the Code was not capable in 
any circumstances of giving rise to 
legitimate expectations regarding the 
possibility of derogating from that 
Code, in exceptional cases, by means 
of individual decisions based on Arti­
cle 95 of the ECSC Treaty. 
The Court of First Instance was also 
correct in holding that the proper 
functioning of the common market in 
I - 10350 
BRITISH STEEL V COMMISSION 
steel clearly involves the obvious need 
for constant adjustments to fluctua­
tions in the economic situation and 
economic operators cannot claim a 
vested right to the maintenance of the 
legal situation existing at a given time. 
An undertaking cannot legitimately 
expect that a given legal situation will 
remain unchanged even though the 
economic conditions in the steel mar­
ket are subject to changes which, in 
some cases, call for specific measures of 
adjustment. 
(see paras 51-52) 
I - 10351