Keywords

Summary



Keywords

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1. Agriculture ° Common organization of the markets ° Milk and milk products ° Additional levy on milk ° Reduction without compensation of reference quantities exempted from the levy ° Principle of the protection of legitimate expectations ° Breach ° None

(Council Regulation No 816/92)

2. Acts of the institutions ° Statement of reasons ° Obligation ° Scope ° Regulations

(EEC Treaty, Art. 190)

3. Agriculture ° Common agricultural policy ° Objectives ° Reconciliation ° Discretion of the institutions ° Stabilization of the market in milk products ° Reduction of reference quantities exempted from the additional levy

(EEC Treaty, Arts 39(1)(c), 40 and 43; Council Regulation No 816/92)

4. Agriculture ° Common organization of the markets ° Milk and milk products ° Additional levy on milk ° Reduction without compensation of reference quantities exempted from the levy ° Right to property ° Freedom to pursue a trade or profession ° Principle of proportionality ° Prohibition of discrimination ° Breach ° None

(EEC Treaty, Art. 40(3), second subpara.; Council Regulation No 816/92)

Summary

1. Since the determination of the guaranteed total quantities under the additional milk levy scheme set up by Regulation No 856/84 falls within the Council' s broad power of appreciation to adjust the common organization of the market in milk and milk products as a result of variations in the economic situation, in principle, no economic operator may entertain a legitimate expectation that the Council will not, in its administration of the common agricultural policy, reduce the guaranteed total quantities and, as a result, individual producers' reference quantities, or that any reduction in individual reference quantities will be accompanied by compensation. In particular, the mere fact that compensation was granted when the total guaranteed quantities were reduced by previous regulations cannot, in the context of a reduction without compensation of the reference quantities for the period 1992/93, have given the operators concerned any legitimate expectation that compensation would be granted on the occasion of each subsequent reduction in those quantities.

Those considerations are all the more pertinent in that the whole of the additional levy scheme was due to expire on 31 March 1992. Since the conditions under which that system could be renewed for future years fell within the Council' s broad power of appreciation, no economic operator could in principle have any legitimate expectation whatever as to the tenor of the legislative measures which the Council would adopt for the period subsequent to that date, particularly as regards the maintenance of the total guaranteed quantities.

Furthermore, given that equivalent reference quantities had been temporarily withdrawn for the five previous years, that degressive compensation amounting to a total of ECU 45.5 per 100 kg had already been paid to producers over the course of that period and that there was still a surplus of milk production, a prudent and well-informed milk-producer could have foreseen the reduction of the reference quantities without compensation for the period from 1 April 1992 to 31 March 1993 effected by Regulation No 816/92. In addition, all interested parties had been expressly informed of the possibility of such a reduction without compensation by the publication on 31 December 1991 of the Commission' s proposals. Since milk production is planned, essentially, on an annual basis from 1 April each year, producers were thus in a position to foresee the proposed measures sufficiently in advance and to take appropriate steps to deal with them.

2. The statement of reasons required by Article 190 of the Treaty must be appropriate to the nature of the measure in question. It must show clearly and unequivocally the reasoning of the Community authority which adopted the contested measure so as to inform the persons concerned of the justification for the measure adopted and thus to enable them to defend their rights and the Court to exercise its powers of review. However, the statement of the reasons on which regulations are based is not required to specify the often very numerous and complex matters of fact and law dealt with in the regulations, provided that they fall within the general scheme of the body of measures of which they form part.

3. In pursuing the objectives of the common agricultural policy the Community institutions must constantly reconcile any conflicts between those objectives taken individually and, where necessary, give any one objective temporary priority in order to satisfy the demands of the economic factors or conditions in view of which their decisions are made.

The Community legislature, which, in matters concerning the common agricultural policy, has a broad discretion which corresponds to the political responsibilities imposed upon it by Articles 40 and 43 of the Treaty, could thus, without stepping beyond the limits of its powers under Article 39 of the Treaty, give temporary priority to the objective of stabilizing the market in milk products, characterized by structural surpluses, as it did when in Regulation No 816/92 it reduced the reference quantities exempted from the additional levy for the 1992/93 milk year.

4. The reduction without compensation in Regulation No 816/92 of the reference quantities exempted from the additional levy on milk for the 1992/93 milk year does not infringe the right to property, the right to pursue a trade or profession, the principle of proportionality or the prohibition of discrimination.

Such a measure cannot be regarded as constituting, in itself, an infringement of the right to property or the right to pursue a trade or profession which, as they are recognized in Community law, are in any event not absolute but may be subject to certain restrictions in the general interest; nor may it be regarded as a breach of the principle of proportionality, since it is not manifestly inappropriate to the objective of stabilizing the market in milk products; finally, it does not infringe the principle of equal treatment laid down in the context of the common organization of the markets by the second subparagraph of Article 40(3) of the Treaty since it is applicable to all the producers in the Community and there are no objective factors to show that certain producers were entitled to claim that they were in a special position and, under the principle of equal treatment, should have been treated in accordance with that position.