Opinion of the Advocate General — ECLI:EU:C:2003:25
Date: 2003-01-16
Based on: Treaty establishing the European Economic Community (1957)
Subject matter: Accession;Environment;Approximation of laws;Waste
Procedure: Action for failure to fulfil obligations - unfounded
Origin: United Kingdom

SUMMARY — CASE C-30/01 
Summary of the Judgment 
Customs union — Customs territory of the Community — Gibraltar — Not 
included — Consequence — Inapplicability of the Treaty provisions and secondary 
legislation on free movements of goods — Damage to the consistency of other 
Community policies — Not relevant 
(Arts 94 EC and 95 EC; 1972 Act of Accession) 
The exclusion of Gibraltar from the cus­
toms territory of the Community by virtue 
of the Act of Accession of the Kingdom of 
Denmark, Ireland and the United Kingdom 
of Great Britain and Northern Ireland 
implies that neither the Treaty rules on free 
movement of goods nor the rules of second­
ary Community legislation intended, as 
regards free circulation of goods, to ensure 
approximation of the laws, regulations and 
administrative provisions of the Member 
States pursuant to Articles 94 EC and 95 
EC are applicable to it. 
That interpretation is not called into ques­
tion by the rules applicable to Ceuta and 
Melilla, which contain an express provision 
that goods originating in those territories 
are exempt from customs duties following 
their release into free circulation in the 
customs territory of the Community. 
Rather, those rules confirm the soundness 
of that interpretation, to the effect that 
exclusion from the customs territory of the 
Community entails the inapplicability of 
the Treaty provisions and secondary legis­
lation on trade in goods, unless otherwise 
expressly provided. 
Of course, failure to apply the directives 
adopted under Articles 94 EC or 95 EC to 
Gibraltar may endanger the consistency of 
other Community policies, such as envi­
ronmental protection, where the objectives 
of those policies are pursued as an ancillary 
aim by those directives. However, that fact 
cannot lead to the extension of the terri­
torial scope of those directives beyond the 
limits imposed by the Treaty and by the Act 
of Accession of Denmark, Ireland and the 
United Kingdom of Great Britain and 
Northern Ireland. 
(see paras 59-60, 63) 
I - 9482