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The legal context is presented as follows at paragraphs 3 to 12 of the order under appeal: ‘Primary law 3. Article 114(1) to (7) TFEU provides as follows: “1. Save where otherwise provided in the Treaties, the following provisions shall apply for the achievement of the objectives set out in Article 26. The European Parliament and the Council shall … adopt the measures for the approximation of the provisions laid down by law, regulation or administrative action in Member States which have as their object the establishment and functioning of the internal market. … 3. The Commission, in its proposals envisaged in paragraph 1 concerning health, safety, environmental protection and consumer protection, will take as a base a high level of protection, taking account in particular of any new development based on scientific facts. Within their respective powers, the European Parliament and the Council will also seek to achieve this objective. 4. If, after the adoption of a harmonisation measure …, a Member State deems it necessary to maintain national provisions on grounds of major needs referred to in Article 36 …, it shall notify the Commission of these provisions as well as the grounds for maintaining them. … 6. The Commission shall, within six months of the notifications as referred to in paragraphs 4 …, approve or reject the national provisions involved after having verified whether or not they are a means of arbitrary discrimination or a disguised restriction on trade between Member States and whether or not they shall constitute an obstacle to the functioning of the internal market. In the absence of a decision by the Commission within this period the national provisions referred to in paragraphs 4 … shall be deemed to have been approved. When justified by the complexity of the matter and in the absence of danger for human health, the Commission may notify the Member State concerned that the period referred to in this paragraph may be extended for a further period of up to six months. 7. When, pursuant to paragraph 6, a Member State is authorised to maintain or introduce national provisions derogating from a harmonisation measure, the Commission shall immediately examine whether to propose an adaptation to that measure.” Secondary law The old toys directive 4. Under Article 2 of the old toys directive, toys may be placed on the market only if they do not jeopardise the safety and/or health of users or third parties when they are used as intended or in a foreseeable way, bearing in mind the normal behaviour of children. In the condition in which it is placed on the market, taking account of the period of foreseeable and normal use, a toy must meet the safety and health conditions laid down in that directive. 5. Annex II (“Essential safety requirements for toys”) to the old toys directive, Part II (“Particular risks”), point 3 (“Chemical properties”), sets as the objective limit values of maximum bioavailability per day for, in particular, antimony, arsenic, barium, lead and mercury. The value limits of bioavailability define the maximum acceptable quantity of a chemical substance which may, resulting from the use of the toys, be absorbed and be available for biological processes in the human body. Those limit values of bioavailability make no distinction according to the consistency of the material of which the toy is made. The first sentence of paragraph 2 of point 3 of part II of Annex II to that directive fixes, in particular, the following limit values, which express the maximum acceptable daily bioavailability in μg: antimony: 0.2; arsenic: 0.1; barium: 25.0; lead: 0.7; and mercury: 0.5. As for nitrosamines and nitrosatable substances, the old toys directive does not set any limit value. 6. It was on that basis that, upon instructions from the Commission, the European Standards Committee drew up European harmonised standard EN 71-3 “Safety of toys” (“EN 71-3”), which infers from the limit values of bioavailability “migration limit values” for toy materials and described a procedure enabling them to be determined. The migration limit values stated the maximum permissible quantity of a chemical substance which may migrate, that is to say, pass from a product to the exterior, for example enter the skin or the gastric juices. If the values of EN 71-3 are observed, the limit values of bioavailability of the old toys directive are deemed to be observed as well. EN 71-3 establishes, in particular, the following migration limit values: antimony: 60 mg/kg; arsenic: 25 mg/kg; barium: 1000 mg/kg; lead: 90 mg/kg; and mercury: 60 mg/kg. The new toys directive 7. In 2003 the Commission decided to review the old toys directive. Following numerous consultations of experts on a number of projects, it submitted [at the beginning of 2008] the proposal for a directive of the European [Parliament] and of the Council on the safety of toys; that proposal was accepted by the Council on 11 May 2009, in spite of the opposition of the German Government, and adopted on 18 June 2009, becoming the new toys directive. Annex II (“Particular safety requirements”), Part III (“Chemical properties”), point 13, of that directive directly sets migration limits. Henceforth a distinction is drawn according to three consistencies of the toy material, depending on whether it is “dry, brittle, powder-like”, “liquid or sticky” or “scraped-off”. 8. Point 13 of Part III of Annex II to the new toy directive thus fixes the following migration limit values: Element mg/kg in dry, brittle, power-like or pliable toy material mg/kg in liquid or sticky toy material mg/kg in scraped-off toy material Antimony 45 11.3 560 Arsenic 3.8 0.9 47 Barium 4 500 1 125 56 000 Lead 13.5 3.4 160 Mercury 7.5 1.9 94 9. Under Article 54 of the new toys directive, Member States were to bring into force the laws, regulations and administrative provisions necessary to transpose that directive into their national orders by 20 January 2011 and to apply those measures with effect from 20 July 2011. Article 55 provides for an exception, however, in that Annex II, Part II, point 3 of the old toys directive is to be repealed only with effect from 20 July 2013. The bioavailability limits fixed by the old toys directive, and also the migration limits inferred therefrom for materials used in the manufacture of toys, therefore remain in force until 20 July 2013, notably with respect to antimony, arsenic, barium, lead and mercury. 10. The German Government maintains that Article 55 of the new toys directive is a lex specialis that derogates from Article 54, so that, in its submission, Annex II, Part III, point 13 of that directive, the provision at issue in the present case, needs to be transposed only by 20 July 2013. The Commission contends, on the contrary, that the deadline for transposition laid down in Article 54 of the new toys directive also applies to the heavy metals to which the present action relates. It is purely in the interest of the economy that Article 55 provides for a transitional period expiring on 20 July 2013, during which toys whose chemical properties comply with the requirements of the old toys directive may continue to be manufactured and marketed. That provision is not intended to grant a longer transposition period to Member States. German national law 11. The old toys directive was implemented in German national law by regulation in 1989. The implementing regulation refers to the safety requirements laid down in Annex II to the old toys directive, which set out the bioavailability limit values applicable, in particular, to the five heavy metals antimony, arsenic, barium, lead and mercury. 12. German national law was adapted to the new legal situation resulting from the publication of the new toys directive in 2011. However, no amendment was introduced with respect to the limit values of the five heavy metals mentioned above, since Annex II, Part II, point 3 of the old toys directive remained in force. For that reason, the Commission, by formal letter of 22 November 2012, initiated a procedure against the Federal Republic of Germany, in accordance with Article 258 TFEU, for failing to fulfil its obligations by not implementing, in part, the new toys directive. By letter of 21 March 2013 the German Government responded to that formal letter, claiming that it had not failed to fulfil its obligations, on the ground that Part [III] of Annex [II] to the new toys directive would produce its effects only from 20 July 2013.’