European Coal and Steel Community v Acciaierie e Ferriere Busseni SpA (in liquidation).
Date: 1990-02-22
15 Although national courts, because of the nature of the powers which the ECSC Treaty has devolved on the Community authorities, in particular the Commission, less often have occasion to apply that Treaty and measures adopted under it and, consequently, to consider their interpretation, cooperation in this area between national courts and the Court of Justice is just as necessary in the context of the ECSC Treaty as it is in that of the EEC and EAEC Treaties, since the requirement of ensuring uniformity in the application of Community law is equally cogent and equally obvious .
16 It would therefore be contrary to the objectives and the coherence of the Treaties if the determination of the meaning and scope of rules deriving from the EEC and EAEC Treaties were ultimately a matter for the Court of Justice, as is provided in identical terms by Article 177 of the EEC Treaty and Article 150 of the EAEC Treaty, thereby enabling those rules to be applied in a uniform manner, but such jurisdiction in respect of rules deriving from the ECSC Treaty were to be retained exclusively by the various national courts, whose interpretations might differ, and the Court of Justice were to have no power to ensure that such rules were given a uniform interpretation .
21 As a preliminary point, it should be noted that the rules evolved by the Court to determine the effects of a directive which has not been transposed into national law apply in equal measure to recommendations adopted under the ECSC Treaty, which are measures of the same kind, binding upon those to whom they are addressed as to the result to be achieved but leaving to them the choice of form and methods to achieve that result .
23 Such a possibility, however, exists only as against the Member State concerned and other public authorities . A directive cannot therefore, of itself, impose obligations on an individual, and a provision of a directive may not be relied upon as such against such a person ( judgment of 26 February 1986 in Case 152/84 Marshall v Southampton and South-West Hampshire Area Health Authority (( 1986 )) ECR 723 ).
24 In cases such as the present, where the ECSC' s claims may compete not only with those of the Member State concerned but also with those of other creditors of the undertaking, the application of the recommendation, far from operating solely against the Member State to which it is addressed, may also reduce the prospects of certain of those other creditors of being paid .
25 If the claim made by the ECSC before the competent national authorities that some of the debts owed to it should be classified on the basis of the regulation as preferential debts were upheld, that would affect not only the position of the Member State in question but would inevitably alter the relative position of the various creditors in the bankruptcy proceedings . It is thus the rights of all those other creditors of the undertaking whose debts do not enjoy any preferential status or enjoy only a preferential status equal to or lower than that of debts owed to the Member State in question in respect of VAT that would be directly affected if this latter preferential status were conferred on certain debts owed to the ECSC .
26 It follows from all the foregoing that the ECSC may, if the recommendation in question has the characteristics which would allow a directive which has not been transposed to be relied on before national courts and tribunals, rely on that recommendation as against a State, subject to the condition that the grant of preferential status to debts owed to the ECSC is effective only as against that State, the Community' s claims being placed on the same footing as any claims by the State . The preferential status granted to the ECSC may not, however, prejudice the rights of creditors other than the State under national legislation on the rights of creditors in the absence of the recommendation .
35 Contrary to the view taken by Busseni, the principle of protection of legitimate expectations cannot prevent preferential treatment from being conferred on debts which arose prior to the entry into force of the measure which introduced such treatment, since that principle cannot, as the Court has already ruled, be extended to the point of generally preventing new rules from applying to the future effects of situations which arose under the earlier rules ( judgment of 14 January 1987 in Case 278/84 Federal Republic of Germany v Commission (( 1987 )) ECR 1 ).