Access to Justice in EU Member States

As a signatory of the Aarhus Convention, the European Union aims to transpose its provisions into EU law. The so-called legislative package presented by the European Commission at the end of 2003 to complete the implementation of the Aarhus Convention at the Community level contained a draft directive on access to justice in environmental matters, a proposal for a council decision on the conclusion of the Convention on behalf of the European Community and a draft regulation applying the three pillars of the Convention to all EU institutions.

Currently, the first element of the package stands little chance of being adopted. This is due to resistance by the Member States. Also, although the Commission claimed in 2003 that the proposal represented „a milestone in strengthening democracy in environmental policy-making“, it now seems willing to give up on the idea of an ”access directive”. It is thus expected that the ”package” will be adopted without the ”access directive” in order to be able to ratify the Convention in time for the meeting of the Parties to the Convention in Almaty in May 2005. This assessment is further supported by the Environment Ministers’ political agreement of December 2004 regarding both the proposed regulation and the proposed decision, which, in the opinion of the Ministers, together pave the way for the Commission to ratify Aarhus on behalf of the EU next year. Whether or not this development is a regrettable one will be assessed in this article based on the results of a comparative study on access to justice in the (old) EU Member States undertaken in 2003/2004.



Copyright: © Lexxion Verlagsgesellschaft mbH
Quelle: JEEPL 1/2005 (Februar 2005)
Seiten: 9
Preis: € 16,00
Autor: Miriam Dross
 
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