Rüdiger Jager v Amt für Landwirtschaft Bützow.
Date: 2008-03-11
46. In the procedure laid down by Article 234 EC providing for cooperation between national courts and the Court of Justice, it is for the latter to provide the national court with an answer which will be of use to it and enable it to determine the case before it. To that end, the Court may have to reformulate the questions referred to it (Case C‑286/05 Haug  [2006] ECR I‑4121, paragraph 17, and Case C‑45/06 Campina  [2006] ECR I‑2089, paragraph 30).
47. Moreover, the Court has a duty to interpret all provisions of Community law which national courts need in order to decide the actions pending before them, even if those provisions are not expressly indicated in the questions referred to the Court of Justice by those courts (see Case C‑304/00 Strawson and Gagg & Sons  [2002] ECR I‑10737, paragraph 58, and Campina , paragraph 31).
59. According to the Court’s case‑law, the principle of the retroactive application of the more lenient penalty forms part of the constitutional traditions common to the Member States and, accordingly, must be considered to be one of the general principles of Community law, which the Court ensures are respected and which national courts are required to abide by (see, to that effect, Joined Cases C‑387/02, C‑391/02 and C‑403/02 Berlusconi and Others  [2005] ECR I‑3565, paragraphs 67 to 69, and Campina , paragraph 32).
60. That principle is expressed more specifically in the second sentence of Article 2(2) of Regulation No 2988/95, pursuant to which the competent authorities are required to apply retroactively to conduct constituting an irregularity within the meaning of Article 2(1), subsequent amendments made by provisions contained in Community sectoral rules introducing less severe administrative penalties (see, to that effect, Case C‑354/95 National Farmers’ Union and Others  [1997] ECR I‑4559, paragraph 41; Gerken , paragraph 61; Campina , paragraph 33; and Case C‑45/05 Maatschap Schonewille‑Prins  [2007] ECR I‑3997, paragraph 55).
61. As the Court has already held, in the area of checks and penalties for irregularities committed under Community law, the Community legislature has, by adopting Regulation No 2988/95, laid down a series of general principles and has required that, as a general rule, all sectoral regulations comply with those principles (see, to that effect, Case C‑94/05 Emsland‑Stärke  [2006] ECR I‑2619, paragraph 50, and the case‑law cited).
63. In that regard, it is necessary, first, to note that, as regards bovine animals not claimed for aid, non‑compliance with the rules on identification and registration introduced by Regulation No 1760/2000, to which Article 10c of Regulation No 3887/92 is applicable ratione temporis  in the main proceedings, constitutes an ‘irregularity’ within the meaning of Article 1(2) of Regulation No 2988/95, where that infringement of a provision of Community law is capable of prejudicing the general budget of the Communities (see, par analogy, Gerken , paragraph 49).
64. Second, it should be borne in mind that a complete exclusion from the benefit of the ‘livestock’ aid scheme in question for the period of twelve months prior to the check, provided for in Article 10c(3) of Regulation No 3887/92, such as that imposed in the case in the main proceedings, clearly constitutes an ‘administrative penalty’ within the meaning of Article 2(2) of Regulation No 2988/95 (see, to that effect, Case C‑63/00 Schilling and Nehring  [2002] ECR I‑4483, paragraphs 26 to 27, and Gerken , paragraph 50; see also, by analogy, National Farmers’ Union and Others , paragraph 40, and Haug , paragraph 21).
66. As the national court itself pointed out, and as all the interested parties who submitted observations to the Court have also accepted, Article 39(1) of the latter regulation – which, as amended by Article 1(11)(a) of Regulation No 118/2004, introduced an upper limit on the reduction applicable for non‑compliance with the rules on identification and registration laid down by Regulation No 1760/2000, in respect of bovine animals not claimed for aid – constitutes such a ‘subsequent amendment’ of the system of penalties defined in Article 10c of Regulation No 3887/92. Article 39(1), which replaced Article 10c, is aimed, in the context of the rules on aid for bovine animals established by Regulation No 1254/1999, at limiting the severity of the penalties applicable for that irregularity (see, by analogy, Campina , paragraphs 36 to 38).
70. In that regard, it must however be pointed out, as the Advocate General indicated at points 71 to 73 of his Opinion, that the system of penalties established in Articles 66 and 67 of Regulation No 796/2004 is not designed to change the nature or severity of the penalties applicable in the context of the aid system for bovine animals established by Regulation No 1254/1999, but is aimed at adapting those penalties, from the entry into force of Regulation No 1782/2003, to the new regulatory context resulting from the CAP reform introduced by the latter regulation, in order to maintain the coherence of the system of penalties applicable to the aid schemes concerned in the light of the principles underlying that reform. The system introduced by Articles 66 and 67 of Regulation No 796/2004 does not therefore reflect a revised assessment by the Community legislature as to whether the penalty is commensurate with the gravity of the irregularity at issue.