Eureopean Union Legal Sources

The EU legal system Legislation Case Law

The EU legal system

The legal order created by the European Community has become a permanent feature of political reality in the Member States of the European Union. Not only is the EU a creature of the law but it pursues its aims exclusively through a new body of law, Community law. This is independent, uniform in all the Member States of the Community, and separate from yet superior to national law. Many of its provisions are directly applicable in all the Member States. On the basis of the European Treaties, thousands of decisions are taken each year which have a major impact on the running of the Member States and on the lives of European citizens. Information about the EU is available on the Europa website.

The Bodleian Law Library is one of several European Documentation Centres in the UK.

Treaties

European integration is based on the three founding Treaties:

• Treaty establishing the European Coal and Steel Community (ECSC), (Paris, in force 23 July 1952)
• Treaties of Rome (in force 1 Jan 1958) establishing the  European Community and the European Atomic Energy Community (Euratom).

The founding treaties have been amended on several occasions, bringing major institutional changes and introducing new areas of responsibility and new Member States :

• Merger Treaty (in force 1 July 1967) replacing the three European Communities (from the founding treaties) with a single commission and council
• Single European Act (SEA) (Luxembourg and The Hague, in force 1 July 1987) allowing achievement of internal market
• Treaty on European Union (Maastricht, in force 1 Nov 1993) introducing political forms of co-operation between Member State governments, and changing the name of the European Economic Community to the European Community
• Treaty of Amsterdam (in force 1 May 1999) amending and renumbering the EU and EC Treaties
• Treaty of Nice (in force 1 Feb 2003) introducing reforms to improve efficiency following enlargement to 25 Member States on 1 May 2004.
• Treaty of Lisbon (in force 1 December 2009) ratified by the EUs 27 member states, and amending existing EU and EC treaties, the Lisbon Treaty strengthened the roles of the European Parliament and national parliaments, created the function of President of the European Council and brought the Charter of Fundmental Rights into European primary law.

Legislation

The terms primary and secondary legislation mean different things when applied to EC legislation than in the UK domestic context. The treaties are primary legislation. They can have a direct effect and are capable of conferring individual rights enforceable in the UK courts without further enactment.

Secondary legislation is that which emanates from the Council and Commission of the European Communities. There are three types:

• Directives, which must be implemented in the domestic legislation of Member States within a certain period of time. In the UK, most Directives are implemented by Statutory Instruments (under the European Communities Act 1972). Others are implemented by Acts.
• Regulations, which are directly applicable in that they do not require national implementing legislation. However, many require additional national provisions in relation to procedure and enforcement.
• Decisions, which are similar to Directives in that they require national implementing legislation. However, unlike Directives, they do not have general application and are addressed to particular member states or particular persons or bodies.

The Council and the Commission also issue Recommendations and Opinions, but these are a form of quasi-legislation and do not have binding force.

 

The Official Journal of the European Communities (OJ)

The authorised text of the treaties and secondary legislation are printed in the Official Journal of the European Communities (OJ). The OJ has four parts:

• L Series (Legislation) - text of agreed legislation, in two sections: Acts whose publication is obligatory (eg, EEC Regulations), and Acts whose publication is not obligatory (eg EEC Directives)
• The Annexe - fulll text of debates of the European Parliament
• S Supplement - notices for tendering for contracts

Citing Regulations and Directives

Regulations are cited as follows:

Type	Treaty	No/Year	Name	OJ citation
Council Regulation	(EEC)	1017/68	applying rules of competition to transport by rail, road and inland waterway	[1968] OJ Spec Ed 302
Council Regulation	(EC)	139/2004	on the control of concentrations between undertakings (the EC Merger Regulation)	[2004] OJ L24/1

 

Directives and decisions are cited similarly, but the year precedes the legislation number:

Type	Treaty	Year/No	Name	OJ citation
Council Directive	(EC)	93/104	concering certain aspects of the organisation of working time	[1993] OJ L307/18
Council Decision	(EC)	2004/411	on the adequate protection of personal data in the Isle of Man	[2004] OJ L151/51

 

Case law

The Court of Justice and the General Court

The Court of Justice of the European Union (ECJ) is the judicial institution of the EU. It is made up of three courts: the Court of Justice, the General Court and the Civil Service Tribunal. Their role is to make sure that Community law is uniformly interpreted and applied in the Member States. The ECJ is made up of 27 judges and eight Advocates General. The judges elect a President from among themselves for a renewable term of three years. The President sits as one of 13 judges at the full court  or the Grand Chamber for particularly imporant cases. Other cases are heard in Chambers of three or five judges. The Advocates General assist the Court by presenting an Opinion on cases. The General Court deals with cases brought by individuals and organisations, against the EU's institutions or regulatory acts and competition law cases. Appeals against decisions of the General Court go to the ECJ. As a result of the Lisbon Treaty the General Court replaced the Court of First Instance.

Law Reports

The European Court Reports (ECR) are published in all the official languages of the EU. All language versions have the same page references. Since 1990 the ECR has included cases heard by the Court of First Instance. The ECR can be found on the EurLex website, and in Justis and Westlaw. The Common Market Law Reports and All England Law Reports (European cases) also publish full reports of ECJ hearings (and are held in Westlaw and LexisLibrary respectively). Many of these law reports include the Advocate-General's Opinion as well as the judgment. Summaries of recent cases appear in the Times and Financial Times.

Citation

The ECR are the most authoritative law report series of the European Union and, like the Law Reports series for the UK, should be cited in preference to other series. The name of the case should be that which appears as the running head on the report and the case number should be given as well. Cases are numbered sequentially throughout the year; the second number in a case number is the year the case entered the court system.

Since 1989, cases have had a letter included in the case number to indicate the court: ECJ case numbers are preceded by C-, General Court and Court of First Instance case numbers are preceded by T-, and Civil Service Tribunal case numbers are preceded by F-.

Each part and volume of the ECR is now printed in two sequences distinguished by a roman numeral I or II: the first covers the ECJ itself and the second the General Court and Court of First Instance. Each sequence has separate pagination. The first page of the report is attached to the volume number by a hyphen.

If a case has not yet been reported in the ECR, cite the CMLR. For an unreported case, cite the relevant notice in the OJ. If the case is not yet reported in the OJ, then cite the case number and case name, followed by the court and date of judgment in brackets.

Case Number	Name of case	Year	Volume	First page
Case 152/84	Marshall v Area Health Authority	[1986]	ECR	723
Case C-106/89	Marleasing	[1990]	ECR I-	4135
Case T-344/99	Arne Mathiesen AS v Council	[2002]	ECR II-	2905
Case C-246/07	European Commission v Sweden	[2010]	3 CMLR	27