Judgment — ECLI:EU:T:2001:24
Date: 2001-01-31
Language of the case: Dutch
Court formation: Fourth Chamber
Based on: Treaty establishing the European Economic Community (1957)
Subject matter: Agriculture and Fisheries;Milk products;Non-contractual liability
Concepts: Basis of liability
Procedure: Action for damages - unfounded
Origin: Netherlands

Summary of the Judgment 
Non-contractual liability — Conditions — Unlawful conduct of the institutions — 
Milk producers deprived of reference quantities under the additional milk levy system 
after suspending their deliveries under the non-marketing premium system — Need to 
establish an intention to resume milk production upon expiry of their non-marketing 
undertaking — Provisional reference quantity obtained at a later date — No effect 
(EC Treaty, Art. 215, second para, (now Art. 288, second para. EC); Council Regulations 
Nos 1078/77 and 857/84) 
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SUMMARY — CASE T-533/93 
Community liability for damage caused to 
certain milk producers as a result of the 
application of Regulation No 857/74 fix­
ing, under the additional milk levy system, 
the reference quantity for each producer on 
the basis of production delivered during a 
reference year, is subject to the condition 
that those producers clearly manifested 
their intention to resume milk production 
upon expiry of their non-marketing under-
t a k i n g given unde r R e g u l a t i o n 
No 1078/77. In order for the illegality 
which led the Court of Justice to declare 
the regulations giving rise to the situation 
of those producers invalid to entitle those 
producers to damages, the producers must 
have been prevented from resuming milk 
production. That means that the producers 
whose undertakings expired before the 
entry into force of Regulation No 857/84 
resumed production or at least took steps 
to do so, such as making investments or 
repairs, or maintaining the equipment 
necessary for such production. 
From that point of view, the fact that a 
producer was refused a quota because, 
when he applied for it, he did not fulfil 
the conditions laid down in the Community 
legislation designed to cure the invalidity of 
Regulation No 857/84, does not exclude 
his having, upon expiry of his undertaking, 
a legitimate expectation in the possibility of 
resuming milk production and therefore his 
being entitled to compensation. On the 
other hand, it may also be the case that 
producers did not intend to resume milk 
production upon expiry of their undertak­
ing and were allocated a reference quantity 
some years later, in so far as they fulfilled 
the conditions then required. Consequently, 
the fact that a producer obtained a provi­
sional reference quantity at a later date 
does not in itself prove that upon expiry of 
his non-marketing undertaking he had the 
intention to resume milk production. 
(see paras 46, 52-53) 
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