Keywords

Summary



Keywords

Community law - Rights conferred on individuals - Breach, by a Member State, of the obligation to transpose a directive - Obligation to make good loss or damage caused to individuals - Requirements for reparation - Application of national law - Limitation period - Whether permissible - Conditions - Compliance with the principle of the effectiveness of Community law - Compliance with the principle of the equivalence of the conditions of reparation with those of similar claims in national law

(Council Directive 80/987)

Summary

Community law, as it stands at present, does not preclude a Member State from requiring any action for reparation of the loss or damage sustained as a result of the belated transposition of Directive 80/987, on the approximation of the laws of the Member States relating to the protection of employees in the event of the insolvency of their employer, to be brought within a limitation period of one year from the date of its transposition into national law, provided that that procedural requirement is no less favourable than procedural requirements in respect of similar actions of a domestic nature.

The setting of reasonable limitation periods for bringing proceedings, after which claims are forfeited, inasmuch as it constitutes an application of the fundamental principle of legal certainty, in principle satisfies the requirement that the conditions, in particular time-limits, laid down by national law for reparation of loss or damage caused to individuals by breaches of Community law for which a State can be held responsible must not be so framed as to make it virtually impossible or excessively difficult to obtain reparation (principle of effectiveness); moreover, the limitation period in question, which not only enables the beneficiaries to ascertain the full extent of their rights but also specifies the conditions under which loss or damage sustained as a result of the belated transposition will be made good, cannot be regarded as making it excessively difficult or, a fortiori, virtually impossible to lodge a claim for reparation.

It is for the national courts to ascertain whether the time-limit in question also complies with the principle that the conditions laid down by their national law as regards reparation of the loss or damage caused to individuals by breaches of Community law for which a Member State can be held responsible must not be less favourable than those relating to similar domestic claims (principle of equivalence). Those courts may properly take into account the fact that applications made in connection with the implementation of the directive and those made under the compensation scheme laid down by it differ as to their objective, and there is no need to undertake a comparison of the procedural rules governing them. Furthermore, if the ordinary Italian system of non-contractual liability were to prove incapable of serving as a basis for an action against public authorities for unlawful conduct for which they can be held responsible in the exercise of their powers and the national court were unable to undertake any other relevant comparison between the time-limit at issue and the conditions relating to similar claims of a domestic nature, the conclusion would have to be drawn that neither the principle of equivalence nor the principle of the effectiveness of Community law precluded the limitation period in question.