Rights, Freedoms and Repression Woman whose soup run fed 250 homeless in Dublin told to cease or face €300k fine 21:35 Feb 07 2 comments Germany cannot give up it's Nazi past - Germany orders Holocaust survivor institutionalized over Cov... 23:31 Jan 14 1 comments Crisis in America: Deaths Up 40% Among Those Aged 18-64 Based on Life Insurance Claims for 2021 Afte... 23:16 Jan 06 0 comments Protests over post-vaccination deaths spread across South Korea 23:18 Dec 26 0 comments Chris Hedges: The execution of Julian Assange 22:19 Dec 19 1 comments more >>Blog Feeds
Anti-EmpireNorth Korea Increases Aid to Russia, Mos... Tue Nov 19, 2024 12:29 | Marko Marjanovi? Trump Assembles a War Cabinet Sat Nov 16, 2024 10:29 | Marko Marjanovi? Slavgrinder Ramps Up Into Overdrive Tue Nov 12, 2024 10:29 | Marko Marjanovi? ?Existential? Culling to Continue on Com... Mon Nov 11, 2024 10:28 | Marko Marjanovi? US to Deploy Military Contractors to Ukr... Sun Nov 10, 2024 02:37 | Field Empty
The SakerA bird's eye view of the vineyard
Alternative Copy of thesaker.is site is available Thu May 25, 2023 14:38 | Ice-Saker-V6bKu3nz
The Saker blog is now frozen Tue Feb 28, 2023 23:55 | The Saker
What do you make of the Russia and China Partnership? Tue Feb 28, 2023 16:26 | The Saker
Moveable Feast Cafe 2023/02/27 ? Open Thread Mon Feb 27, 2023 19:00 | cafe-uploader
The stage is set for Hybrid World War III Mon Feb 27, 2023 15:50 | The Saker
Public InquiryInterested in maladministration. Estd. 2005RTEs Sarah McInerney ? Fianna Fail?supporter? Anthony Joe Duffy is dishonest and untrustworthy Anthony Robert Watt complaint: Time for decision by SIPO Anthony RTE in breach of its own editorial principles Anthony Waiting for SIPO Anthony
Voltaire NetworkVoltaire, international editionVoltaire, International Newsletter N?113 Fri Dec 20, 2024 10:42 | en Pentagon could create a second Kurdish state Fri Dec 20, 2024 10:31 | en How Washington and Ankara Changed the Regime in Damascus , by Thierry Meyssan Tue Dec 17, 2024 06:58 | en Statement by President Bashar al-Assad on the Circumstances Leading to his Depar... Mon Dec 16, 2024 13:26 | en Voltaire, International Newsletter N?112 Fri Dec 13, 2024 15:34 | en |
Government Breaching EU Health and Environment Law in a ‘General and Structural Manner’
national |
rights, freedoms and repression |
feature
Friday September 24, 2004 15:38 by Joe Noonan / Indymedia Editorial - NLCC jnoonan at nlcc dot ie Cork 021 427 0518
Advocate General of the European Court of Justice reads Government the Riot Act: A report on the health risk caused by illegal dumping carried out by the state. Endangering human health and causing environmental harm is not what any government wants on its CV. But that is exactly what the Irish Government has been doing in the opinion of the Advocate General of the European Court of Justice. Government press people are trying to kill the story. The Government press response today (as carried in the Irish Times today) claiming that this was ancient history and that things are different now does not stand up. Already further legal action is threatened by the Commission in relation to a proposal to put a superdump next to a candidate Special Area of Conservation in Waterford. The Government tried to suppress the Commission's warning letter to it (known as a 'Reasoned Opinion'). Happily the letter came into the public domain despite that effort. The Government of Ireland was slammed for ‘persistent widespread and serious’ failure to comply with EU waste law in the European Court Thursday (Sept. 23). Advocate-General Geelhoed told the Court that as a result of this failure the government has endangered human health and caused environmental harm. In a formal opinion delivered to the Court in Case C-494/01Commission v Ireland the Advocate-General recommends that the Court should declare Ireland to be in breach of no fewer than four separate Articles of the Waste Directive and also in breach of Article 10 of the EC Treaty. The Advocate-General’s opinion is not binding but is normally followed by the Court. Because of the significance of the issues at stake in the case, both parties’ arguments were heard by the Court’s Grand Chamber (full panel) in July. The EU Commission brought the case to the Court following complaints about breaches of EU waste law at twelve separate locations throughout the country, including Dublin, Cork, Waterford, Wexford, Limerick, Carlow, Laois and Louth. Government lawyers had claimed that these were only 'isolated incidents' and that there was no evidence of 'actual environmental harm'. The Advocate General flatly rejected these claims and in an unusually strongly worded opinion said that there were sufficient grounds for establishing that Ireland had infringed the Waste Directive in a ‘general and structural manner’ - in effect institutionalised lawbreaking. The government has, he says, infringed its obligations because, among other reasons, it has failed to ‘prevent the abandonment, dumping and uncontrolled disposal of waste, thereby endangering human health and causing environmental harm’. This is the first time any EU Member State has been criticised for breaching EU health and environment law in a ‘general and structural manner’. The Advocate General’s opinion is likely to prove devastating to the Government’s defence strategy in this landmark case. His recommendation that Ireland should pay the legal costs of the case would see a hefty legal bill for the Irish taxpayer - another consequence of the ‘persistent widespread and serious’ failure by Government to obey and uphold a fundamental law which is supposed to protect public health and the environment. Whether any of this makes any real difference will depend in part on whether people know about it. So far the Government Press people are playing a blinder in killing the story. The line is that this is all ancient history and they're reformed characters now... The full text of the Advocate General’s Opinion is on the European Court’s website at www.curia.eu.int. Go here and click on the case number in the top right corner (Case C-494/01) to Access Full Text of Advocate General's Opinion. |
View Full Comment Text
save preference
Comments (14 of 14)