Opinion of the Advocate General — ECLI:EU:C:2001:333
Date: 2001-06-14
Based on: Treaty establishing the European Coal and Steel Community (1951)
Subject matter: State aids;Competition
Procedure: Action for annulment - successful
Origin: Germany

Summary of the Judgment 
Obligations of the Member States — Failure to fulfil an obligation — Proceedings under 
Article 88 CS — Purpose — Obtaining a change in behaviour on the part of the 
recalcitrant State — Commission decision establishing a failure which has already 
exhausted its effects — Irregularity 
(Art. 88 CS) 
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SUMMARY — CASE C-276/99 
The purpose of the Article 88 CS procedure 
is to bring about a change in behaviour on 
the part of the recalcitrant State, and not to 
record in abstracto that a failure existed in 
the past. That interpretation also follows 
from the wording of the second sentence of 
the first paragraph and the first sentence of 
the third paragraph of that provision, 
which expressly provide that the Member 
State in question must fulfil its obligation. 
Where, on the date on which the Commis­
sion initiated the procedure, the failure to 
fulfil obligations which was alleged by the 
Commission had exhausted all its effects, 
with the result that the Member State in 
question was no longer able to take effec­
tive action to put an end to that failure even 
if it had wished to, the Commission's 
decision establishing that failure must be 
regarded as not taken in accordance with 
the purpose of Article 88 CS and, therefore, 
flawed in that the essential purpose of the 
procedure under that article could not 
objectively be achieved at any stage of the 
procedure. 
(see paras 24, 26-27, 31) 
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