4.

The answer must be sought in the wording, structure and objectives of Directive 69/169. In that respect the following observations are called for. (a) In the present case it is necessary to consider the scope to be given to the provision excluding from exemption from Common Customs duties persons who cross to the frontier zone opposite that in which they reside. As is shown by comparing the recitals of the four relevant directives in the present case, ( 9 ) the objective of the Community legislature is that measures should be taken ‘for the greater liberalization of the system of taxes on imports in travel between Member States’. To that end there has been progressive ‘alleviation’ in relation to exemption by successive directives. In taking this action the Community legislature has intended that ‘people in the Member States [should] become more aware of the reality of the Common Market’. ( 10 ) Thus whereas Directive 69/169, before the subsequent amendments, provided that Member States ‘may set lower limits as to value and/or quantity for the exemption of goods when they are imported... in frontier-zone travel... ’ ( 11 ) without giving further detail, Directive 72/230 imposed a number of limits on that power. On the one hand, Member States may no longer reduce the quantitative exemption beyond a certain limit (Article 5 (1) (a) and (b)) and, on the other, only goods acquired in a defined frontier zone may, except where proof to the contrary is provided by the importer, be excluded from duty-free entitlement. The mere recital of those provisions leads me to conclude that such ‘restrictions’, as Article 5 (4) of Directive 69/169, as amended, expressly calls them, must be strictly interpreted: they are justified only if they are necessary to achieve the objective for which they were introduced. (b) The exemptions, whatever they may be, are justified only if they relate to imports which ‘have no commercial character’. The importations affected are thus such which ‘(a) take place occasionally, and (b) consist exclusively of goods for the personal or family use of the travellers, or of goods intended as presents; the nature or quantity of such goods must not be such as might indicate that they are being imported for commercial reasons’. ( 12 ) It was in fact to be feared that frontier-zone residents, by reason of the considerable facilities for travel which they have and the attraction represented by the geographical proximity of a commercial centre of a frontier-zone municipality of another Member State, might abuse the duty-free entitlement by making frequent imports for commercial purposes. As the Commission points out, there is no doubt that the power given to the Member States to reduce duty-free entitlement in the case of frontier-zone travel is intended inter alia to protect retail traders in frontier-zone municipalities who would have been the first to suffer from such a flow of imports. However, the ever-present opportunity for frontier-zone residents to purchase in the neighbouring country justifies the exemption to duty-free entitlement only in the case of purchases made in the immediate proximity of the customs crossing point, itself situated in the like proximity to the municipality of residence: only in that case may it be presumed that the importation is not only likely to be of a commercial nature but is also likely to deflect trade away from the frontier municipality situated in the other Member State. On the other hand, there can be no such presumption when the customs crossing point is'further than 15 km from the place of residence and/or place of purchase. In other words, only importations carried out in a frontier-zone municipality situated less than 15 km from the customs crossing point used by a person residing less than 15 km from the same customs point should, in my opinion, be subject to the reduced dutyfree entitlement. That interpretation is, furthermore, in line with the practice of the Member States which either do not apply the reduced exemptions in the case of intra-Community frontier-zone travel or, when they o apply them, adopt the criterion I have proposed.