European Court of Justice

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EU courts

The European Court of Justice, or the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU), is the supreme judicial authority on EU law, it involves three separate courts:

Court of Justice comprises one judge from each EU country plus 11 Advocates General.
- The number of judges in the Court of Justice is set to double to 56 over the next four years in response to the increasing case load.
- There were 1270 pending cases in November 2015.
- See below for its activities.
General Court comprises one judge from each EU country
- Considers cases brought by companies and individuals against the EU institutions.
- Considers cases brought by member states against the European Commission or the ECB.
- Its most important work is in the field of competition, intellectual property and external trade law.
Civil Service Tribunal comprises seven judges
- Hears disputes involving employees of the EU institutions.

ECJ rulings

The ECJ rules on questions of EU law i.e. EU treaties and other EU legislation. Its decisions are binding on EU institutions and member states. The ECJ has four main activities:

Hears challenges to EU legislation brought by member states (for example, the UK government’s challenge on bankers’ bonuses).
Clarifies points of European law at the request of courts in member states.
Settles disputes between EU institutions.
Determines whether a member state is in breach of EU law (in response to a complaint from the European Commission).

EU law has three main sources:

Primary law: the Treaties establishing the European Union.
Secondary law: regulations and directives which are based on the Treaties.
Supplementary law: case law by the ECJ, international law and general principles of EU law.

The courts of the member states and the ECJ apply EU law.

EU law has supremacy over laws of member states where it applies (i.e. this is limited to EU competences).
A member state may be taken to the ECJ for failing to meet its obligations under EU law.
Big fines may be imposed for non-compliance with the court’s rulings.

A common criticism of the ECJ is that it engages in ‘activist’ rulings aimed at increasing its own power as an institution. However, the ECJ often makes rulings because of conflicts between different EU objectives. In addition, many EU decisions (and supporting EU laws) are deliberately left politically unclear on the assumption that the ECJ will ‘fill in the blanks’ later.

Unclear or ambiguous EU law will inevitably give rise to cases for the ECJ to resolve. As a result, ECJ decisions may be seen as having political consequences. Inevitably, some cases brought to the ECJ reflect problems with the overall nature of EU decision-making or unresolved political differences.

UK and the ECJ

The UK tended to end up less frequently in court with the ECJ than other member states, according to the Institute for Government (2003-2016 – see Figure 2.3). The UK usually preferred to settle matters before they came to court. Indeed, the number of cases brought by the ECJ against member states declined steadily over the period.

UK citizens have taken cases to the ECJ against the UK government or UK-based organisations. This may be why the UK government had criticised the ECJ. However, the ECJ provided an important safety valve for UK citizens and businesses when avenues within UK law were exhausted. Examples include:

Williams v British Airways plc (protection of an employee’s right to holiday pay).
Where the UK has failed to follow EU law (e.g. in relation to air pollution laws).
In the 1990’s, the UK had initially failed to implement the Working Time Directive (which provides protections to workers), but the ECJ upheld that the UK had to implement it.