L’ELSJ à l’heure de l’état d’urgence : un effet collatéral du « syndrome shadok » de la lutte antiterroriste française ?

ORIGINAL PUBLISHED ON CDRE PAGE  (2 FÉVRIER 2016)

by Pierre Berthelet, CDRE

« Il vaut mieux pomper d’arrache-pied même s’il ne se passe rien que risquer qu’il se passe quelque chose de pire en ne pompant pas ». La devise des Shadoks n’aura nullement échappé à l’observateur du droit français de la lutte antiterroriste au moment où le gouvernement prolonge la loi sur l’état d’urgence, validée par le Conseil d’État dans une ordonnance du 27 janvier 2016. La France, en proie à une pulsion législative si bien évoquée dans l’ouvrage Un droit pénal postmoderne ?, empile les textes juridiques destinés à faire face à la menace terroriste. La France semble être atteinte du « syndrome Shadok » caractérisé par une inflation législative constante.

Ce « syndrome Shadok » évoqué par Yves Trintignon de l’Université du Québec met en évidence le fait que le gouvernement français, confronté aux attaques terroristes de janvier et de novembre 2015, s’est empressé de renforcer les capacités des services de renseignement sans réellement s’interroger sur les difficultés rencontrées en matière d’organisation, sur les défaillances de leurs méthodes, ou encore sur les lacunes de leurs pratiques opérationnelles. Pis, il aggrave la situation en répondant promptement à la demande de ces services, et à l’inquiétude de l’opinion publique, sans véritablement faire preuve de distanciation à l’égard des effets pervers à plus long terme.

 

Une telle vision à court-termiste consistant à « pomper » sans relâche, c’est-à-dire à renforcer constamment le dispositif antiterroriste, est constatée à l’échelon national, mais aussi à l’échelon européen. D’emblée, la construction européenne dans ce domaine connaît des progrès sensibles. Ces avancées, observables concernant particulièrement l’ELSJ, s’expliquent notamment par l’implication de la France dans le processus décisionnel, désireuse que l’Union soit pleinement associée à la lutte qu’elle mène (1).

 

Cependant, à y regarder de près, la construction européenne risque d’être davantage victime que bénéficiaire de l’engagement de la France dans l’intégration européenne. En effet, son implication est avant tout dictée par une logique en vertu de laquelle le gouvernement entend obtenir un crédit politique à travers une réaffirmation de son autorité. L’État cherche à se légitimer à travers les lois qu’il prend, peu importe d’ailleurs leur efficacité. Il est d’ailleurs à noter que la France réclame une plus grande implication de l’Union dans la lutte antiterroriste, mais elle se garde bien de demander une évaluation globale de l’efficacité des politiques menées par les différents États membres.

 

Le « syndrôme Shadok » de la lutte antiterroriste française, qui consiste à pomper toujours plus même si cela ne sert à rien, a un impact néfaste sur l’édification de l’ELSJ à long terme (2).

 

Toute tentative de vouloir ralentir cette course effrénée est susceptible de constituer un obstacle inadmissible à l’égard d’un État membre désireux de se défendre face à une menace d’une gravité extrême. Qui plus est, les valeurs sur lesquelles l’Union est fondée, la préservation de l’État de droit et le respect des droits de l’homme pourraient faire les frais d’une telle course aveugle. On voit dès lors l’importance du juge européen, comme rempart face au cercle vicieux sécuritaire traduit en langage shadok par « je pompe donc je suis ».

 

  1. Le rôle moteur dans la lutte antiterroriste d’une France aux allures pro-européenne

 

La France apparaît comme l’aiguillon, désireuse de progresser dans l’intégration européenne, et ce, pour ce qui est de l’ELSJ. Un document du Conseil indique ainsi que la délégation française souhaite élargir le champ de la proposition de directive présentée par la Commission européenne le 2 décembre 2012.

Pour mémoire, ce texte, remplaçant la décision-cadre 2002/475/JAI du Conseil relative à la lutte contre le terrorisme, entend harmoniser la législation nationale concernant l’incrimination des « combattants étrangers », de même que l’aide apportée à la sortie du territoire. La décision-cadre a fait l’objet d’une modification en 2008 pour rendre punissable la provocation publique à commettre une infraction terroriste, ainsi que la diffusion sur Internet de la propagande terroriste.

De son côté, la France estime qu’il convient d’aller au-delà de cette actualisation de la législation européenne au regard des textes internationaux ayant trait à ce phénomène des « combattants étrangers » (la résolution du Conseil de sécurité des Nations unies (RCSNU) 2178 (2014)) et le protocole additionnel à la Convention du Conseil de l’Europe pour la prévention du terrorisme de mai 2015).

Elle considère notamment qu’il importe de rendre punissable dans tous les États membres le trafic d’œuvres d’art en provenance de zones sous contrôle terroriste et de supprimer les pages internet incitant au terrorisme ou d’en bloquer l’accès.

Les ajouts de la France dans la proposition de directive s’inscrivent dans un contexte où ces questions font l’objet d’une attention particulière en droit interne.

Ainsi, concernant le trafic d’œuvres d’art, la répression du commerce illicite de biens culturels figure dans le projet de loi contre le crime organisé et le terrorisme, qui doit être présenté courant février 2016.

Pour ce qui est de la suppression des pages internet faisant l’apologie du terrorisme, le Sénat avait adopté le 1er avril 2015 une résolution européenne réclamant l’extension des compétences du Centre européen de lutte contre la cybercriminalité (EC3) en lui donnant la possibilité de supprimer des contenus terroristes ou extrémistes.

Peu avant, le 5 février 2015, un décret a été adopté fixant les modalités permettant aux internautes d’avoir accès à des pages web faisant cette apologie.

La force de proposition de la France concernant ce projet de directive est le reflet d’une volonté politique affichée concernant l’ELSJ : dans une déclaration après le Conseil JAI à Amsterdam du 25 janvier 2016, le ministre de l’Intérieur, Bernard Cazeneuve, fixe les demandes françaises, entendues comme des priorités « essentielles » figurant dans un agenda qui « n’est pas négociable ». Il énumère également les mesures sur lesquelles la France a obtenu satisfaction, en prenant le soin d’ajouter que bon nombre de ces mesures ont été initiées sous son impulsion : la directive PNR, la modification de l’article 7-2 du code frontières Schengen visant à instaurer des contrôles approfondis sur les ressortissants européens quittant l’espace Schengen, ou encore la révision de la directive de 1991 relative au contrôle des armes à feu.

 

  1. La stratégie de fuite en avant sécuritaire d’une France tentée par le repli national

 

La déclaration du ministre de l’Intérieur à l’issue du Conseil JAI du 25 janvier 2016 démontre l’intention de la France de continuer « son travail de persuasion » avec « beaucoup de volontarisme », pour reprendre les termes du texte. Elle fait office également de satisfecit, à la fois au sujet de l’efficacité de l’implication de la France dans la sphère institutionnelle et concernant l’action de l’Union européenne menée sous sa houlette, en matière de lutte antiterroriste.

 

La France s’est engagée depuis de nombreuses années dans une logique de renforcement continuel de l’arsenal répressif au nom de ce que le président de la République a qualifié de « guerre contre le terrorisme ». La fuite en avant sécuritaire se traduit par l’adoption de nombreux textes en 2014 et en 2015 : plan d’avril 2014 contre la radicalisation violente et les filières terroristes, loi du 13 novembre 2014 renforçant les dispositions relatives à la lutte contre le terrorisme et décrets d’application du 14 janvier 2015 destinés à mettre en place l’interdiction administrative de sortie du territoire des ressortissants français, décret précité du 5 février 2015, décret du 4 mars 2015 relatif au déréférencement des sites, plan d’action du 18 mars 2015 pour lutter contre le financement du terrorisme, loi du 24 juin 2015 sur le renseignement et ses multiples décrets d’application, et décret du 14 novembre 2015 instaurant le régime de l’état d’urgence, prorogé par la loi du 20 novembre 2015.

 

D’autres projets sont en cours : projet de loi précité contre le crime organisé et le terrorisme, proposition de loi relative à la sécurité dans les transports, projet de loi constitutionnelle « de protection de la nation » comprenant deux volets, à savoir la déchéance de la nationalité d’un binational devenu français et l’inscription dans la Constitution des conditions de déclenchement de l’état d’urgence.

 

Cette fuite en avant est inquiétante, car s’il est possible de comprendre la stratégie de la France dans une perspective purement nationale, notamment à l’aune des manœuvres déployées par le gouvernement à l’égard du Front national, il est aussi possible d’inscrire le renforcement de l’arsenal répressif dans un contexte de dérive autoritaire que connaissent bon nombre de gouvernements européens, la Pologne au premier chef, vis-à-vis de laquelle la Commission a engagé une procédure de dialogue sur la base de l’article 7.1 TUE.

 

Une telle fuite en avant se traduit, sur le plan européen, par davantage de fermeté de la part de la France : fermeté vis-à-vis d’un Parlement européen réticent à adopter la directive PNR, fermeté à l’égard des délégations nationales enclines à tergiverser au Conseil sur les propositions d’actes en instance d’adoption, fermeté à l’encontre de la Commission désireuse de vérifier la conformité de la décision française de rétablir les contrôles aux frontières intérieures.

 

L’ultimatum lancé à celle-ci par le gouvernement français concernant le rétablissement de ces contrôles en vertu de l’art. 25 du Code Frontières Schengen, aussi longtemps que perdurerait la menace terroriste, est significatif de sa volonté d’afficher, sur tous les fronts, une détermination sans faille. Or, lerétablissement temporaire prolongé en dehors des délais prévus par le Code pose problème du point de vue de la légalité européenne, en particulier au regard des art. 23, 23bis et 25 du code.

L’attitude de la France consistant à faire preuve de fermeté tous azimuts lui permet de faire illusion sur le plan politique. Celle-ci se pare des atours d’une nation leader de la construction européenne pour mieux dissimuler les tentations de repli national. En effet, les efforts menés pour se trouver à la pointe de la lutte antiterroriste masquent la prévalence des intérêts nationaux érigés, en matière sécuritaire, au rang de principes absolus, insusceptibles de limitation.

 

D’ailleurs, pour s’en convaincre, il suffit de constater que, quel que soit le gouvernement, de droite ou de gauche, la France n’hésite pas à remettre en cause publiquement l’acquis de Schengen si celui-ci lui porte préjudice. Une telle attitude se révèle problématique d’un point de vue politique, car elle menace de détricoter cet acquis, faisant, par la même occasion, le jeu de certains gouvernements situés à l’Est de l’Europe.

 

Une telle attitude, prompte par ailleurs à désigner Schengen comme bouc émissaire, et à pointer les défaillances de l’ELSJ, se révèle problématique d’un point de vue juridique, car le droit français adopté dans le contexte de la lutte antiterroriste pose la délicate question de sa conformité du point de vue du droit européen. Ainsi, une France sous état d’urgence prolongé aurait-elle pu adhérer à l’Union européenne conformément aux critères insérés aux art. 6 et 49 TUE ? De manière générale, la législation française est-elle conforme à l’art. 2 TUE ainsi qu’aux dispositions de la Charte européenne des droits fondamentaux ?

 

La question est d’autant plus pertinente que le forcing français à l’égard de la directive PNR pourrait conduire à une annulation de ladite directive et ce, au regard de la jurisprudence Digital Rights. À ce propos, les juges européens se montrent sévères à l’égard de la dérive sécuritaire observée dans les États membres.

 

Prenant appui sur cette jurisprudence Digital Rights, la Cour européenne des droits de l’Homme, dans un arrêt du 12 janvier 2016, Szabo et Vissy c. Hongrie (voir l’analyse de Sylvie Peyrou), s’est montrée très ferme à l’égard des mesures nationales prises dans le cadre de la lutte contre le terrorisme, en l’occurrence les opérations secrètes de surveillance antiterroriste.

 

Le rôle du juge européen n’a jamais été aussi important, non seulement comme défenseur du droit, mais aussi comme gardien des valeurs européennes. Il s’érige comme l’ultime recours face à cette fuite en avant sécuritaire préoccupante pour l’Europe et pour la France. Les mots de la Commission nationale consultative des droits de l’homme (CNCDH) dans sa déclaration du 16 janvier 2015 sur l’état d’urgence et ses suites sonnent particulièrement juste : « la France ne doit pas, sous l’emprise de la sidération, sacrifier ses valeurs, au contraire, elle doit renforcer la démocratie ».

 

Free at last? Detention, the European Arrest Warrant and Julian Assange

ORIGINAL PUBLISHED ON EU LAW ANALYSIS (Friday, 5 February 2016)

by Steve Peers

“Bianca Jagger is here!”

I had just arrived at a meeting in the House of Lords, to give a talk on the European Arrest Warrant (EAW) and human rights. I thought that having the famous human rights activist in the audience when I spoke would be the most exciting thing that could happen to me that day. But I was wrong.

“Bianca Jagger wants to ask you a question, before we start!”

My heart skipped a beat as the beautiful activist walked slowly, catwalkishly, across the room in my direction. Finally, she was right in front of me. My heart stopped beating entirely. And then she asked me her question:

“Will you be speaking for very long?”

Needless to say I subsequently gave one of my shortest talks ever – although I suspect that it seemed endless to Ms. Jagger. Indeed, I imagine that for her, listening to my talk was comparable to the lengthy periods of pre-trial detention which some people face on the basis of EAWs.

This brings me to Lanigan: a key judgment on lengthy pre-trial detention and EAWs, issued by the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) last year. It seems only appropriate that I am discussing this case rather belatedly. On the other hand, though, it is very timely to take the opportunity to discuss also the relevance of this judgment to the UN opinion (released today) on the ‘arbitrary detention’ of Julian Assange – who is also facing an EAW. And just as I promised Ms. Jagger, I won’t detain my beautiful readers for very long.

The Lanigan judgment

Unfortunately EAWs are often issued for the most trivial reasons. A carpenter, removing a wardrobe door until he got paid. (What Would Jesus Do?) The theft of a piglet. And my personal favourite: the friend of a friend who came to a house party and took someone else’s can of beer. That last case makes me pine for the return of the death penalty.

Yet the Lanigan case usefully reminds us that EAWs are also issued for the most serious of crimes. Mr. Lanigan was wanted on murder charges in the UK, which issued an EAW to the Irish Republic. He was detained in Ireland while he fought the execution of the EAW. Finally, the Irish courts decided to ask the CJEU if the months he spent fighting the EAW were a breach of the deadlines to execute it – as set out in the EU Framework Decision which created it – or of human rights law. This was the first Irish reference to the CJEU on criminal issues, following the expiry on the limits of the CJEU’s criminal law jurisdiction in December 2014 (for more on that transitional issue, see here).

According to the CJEU, the continued detention of Mr. Lanigan pending the EAW did not invalidate the EAW itself. Nor was there an obligation to release him. First of all, the Court insisted that the time limits in the legislation (60 days to execute an EAW, with a possible 30 day extension) had to be complied with strictly. This followed its earlier ruling in the Forrest case, which concerned the British schoolteacher who had fled to France with an underage schoolgirl.

But then the Court ate its previous words. The problem was that in this case, strict compliance with the time limits conflicted with the underlying obligation to execute the EAW. The Court referred to its many previous rulings insisting on the limited exceptions to that latter obligation. So it gave preference to the underlying rule, ruling that the EAW remained valid once the deadline expired: the ‘time limit’ was not really a time limit at all. (I wouldn’t advise students, lawyers, journalists or many others to take the same approach to deadlines.)

It got worse for Mr. Lanigan. The CJEU ruled that the expiry of the deadlines did not mean that Ireland had to release him from prison either. It pointed out that the rules on detention in the Framework Decision were very vague: national judicial authorities have to decide on detention; the fugitive may be given bail, if the authorities take steps to stop him or her absconding; and the issue is basically subject to national law. The EU rules do say that fugitives must be released from custody after the execution of an EAW, if the deadlines to surrender the person to the State which issued the EAW are not complied with. But in contrast, there is no such obligation if a State misses the deadline to execute the EAW in the first place.

Yet if there’s no real deadline to execute an EAW, and no obligation to release a fugitive from jail because that ‘time limit’ is a legal fiction, people could effectively end up facing indefinite detention without trial. Rightly realising that this was unacceptable, the Court, for the first time, gave some grudging respect to the many references to human rights set out in the EAW law. In this case, that meant the rules on detention were subject to Article 6 of the EU Charter on Fundamental Rights, which had to be applied consistently with the rules on detention set out in Article 5 ECHR. So the relevant case law of the European Court of Human Rights applied: fugitives can only be detained if the EAW procedure is being carried out with ‘due diligence’. The national court has to consider all the factors, including any lax behaviour by the Irish authorities, the conduct of the fugitive himself, the possible sentence (severe in this case), the risk of absconding and the huge overrun of the deadlines.

The Assange case

In Lanigan, the CJEU wasn’t called upon to deal with the two detention issues that most frequently arise in practice as regards EAWs: (a) the lengthy pre-trial detention that fugitives are often subject to in the issuing State after they are surrendered there, and (b) the poor detention conditions which they sometimes face there. The CJEU will shortly rule on the latter issue, in the cases of Aranyosiand Caldararu.

Nor, obviously, was it called upon to deal with the peculiar circumstances of Mr. Assange: fleeing into a third State’s embassy, to escape the execution of an EAW, because the charges which motivated the issuing of the EAW were allegedly politically motivated, and a further extradition request from the USA was looming. Today we have a new twist: the opinion of a UN body that his ‘detention’ in the embassy is ‘arbitrary’.

How does EU law apply to this issue? In fact, EU law issues were discussed in the earlier UK litigation, up until the Supreme Court judgment. At that point, the UK courts were, like the Irish courts, unable to ask the CJEU questions about EU criminal laws adopted before the entry into force of the Treaty of Lisbon. Now they can. So Assange could bring a fresh challenge in the UK courts to the execution of the EAW in light of the UN ruling. He could either (a) request the UK courts (at any level) to ask the CJEU questions about the EAW law (the CJEU will likely give an emergency ruling, within about three months), or (b) litigate back up to the Supreme Court, then go to the European Court of Human Rights to complain if he loses his case.

What’s the likely outcome? The European Court of Human Rights is usually keen to take into account the opinion of other human rights bodies (for an exception, see the RMT case); but the CJEU is not. In the Grant case, it rubbished the opinion of the UN Human Rights Committee, and in the well-known Kadi line of case law, it deemed that the UN Security Council had not provided enough legal protection when listing people as terrorist suspects.

Applying the Lanigan case to the facts of Assange, there is a strong obligation upon the UK to execute the EAW, which obviously remains valid. His continued ‘detention’ also remains valid, since he has the obvious intention to abscond. There are human rights arguments: the risk of an unfair trial in Sweden or the USA, and the ‘detention conditions’ in the embassy. As I noted above, the CJEU is usually dismissive of human rights arguments in the EAW context, although there was a nod to ECHR case law in Lanigan. On this issue, things should be clearer after the judgments in Aranyosi and Caldararu, which we can expect before Easter.

It might be better, from Assange’s perspective, to fight all the way again through the UK courts without asking for a CJEU reference, and then head to the ECtHR in Strasbourg. That’s not entirely up to him, though: the UK government could ask the courts to send questions to the CJEU. If he does get to Strasbourg, the ECtHR might be torn between its usual enthusiasm to endorse the work of international human rights bodies, and its traditional deference to the CJEU on human rights matters within the scope of EU law. The Assange saga might have awhile to run yet.

“EPPO and OLAF investigations:The judicial review and procedural guarantees”

Download the E-book: “EPPO and OLAF investigations:The judicial review and procedural guarantees”

Two years after the publication of “La protezione dei diritti fondamentali procedurali dalle esperienze investigative dell’OLAF all’istituzione del Procuratore europeo” (Protecting fundamental rights from the investigations of OLAF to the future EPPO), which contained reflections emerging from the international conference held in Rome from 12 to 14 June 2013, the Foundation Lelio and Lisli Basso – ISSOCO thought it was necessary, given the changes introduced, to stimulate a new debate on the establishment of a European Public Prosecutor’s Office.

To this end, it organised an international conference on 21-22 May 2015, preceded by the drafting of a background paper on the current state of the debate on the European Public Prosecutor’s Office. During the conference, speakers from EU institutions, the judiciary, and the legal profession and academia, presented their reflections on the issue, which have been collected in this book.

The first session focused on the current status and the main issues under discussion. In July 2013, the European Commission presented its proposal for a Regulation Establishing the European Public Prosecutor’s Office with the aim of creating a new prosecution system at EU level to address the shortcomings of the present system, based solely on criminal procedures undertaken by national judicial authorities, which have no jurisdiction over cross-border cases of fraud to the financial interests of the EU. The Commission proposal was questioned by the reasoned opinion of 14 national parliamentary assemblies, complaining that it did not comply with the principle of subsidiarity. Disagreeing with the objections raised, the Commission left the original proposal unchanged, but this underwent substantial changes during work undertaken by the Council. The negotiations that took place first under the Greek and Italian Presidencies, then under the Latvian Presidency, will probably extend into the next Presidencies (Luxembourg, Netherlands).

None of the speakers disputes the issue of “whether” the European Public Prosecutor should be established (fraud against the EU is in fact considered by everyone to be a criminal phenomenon of growing importance and gravity, which the establishment of the European Public Prosecutor should help to curb), but there is disagreement about “what” form it should take.

Two opposing views may be identified regarding the structure, the appointment and powers of the European Public Prosecutor’s Office. On the one hand, the European Commission proposal envisages a vertical decentralized structure with exclusive competence for crimes affecting the financial interests of the EU (which are the subject of the proposal for a PIF directive 2012). On the other, the Council’s proposal is more horizontal in nature and much more intergovernmental, providing for joint jurisdiction with Member States. Many speakers complained that this second vision diminishes the European dimension of the European Public Prosecutor’s Office and risks paralyzing its functions. Favorable to the Commission proposal is the European Parliament, which has called on the Council to take account of its position and to involve it in discussions, in line with the principle of sincere interinstitutional cooperation, in order to avoid problems at the time of the parliamentary vote on the final text.

Another element that some of the speakers at the Conference agree on, is the need to clarify and regulate the relations between the European Public Prosecutor’s Office and the existing bodies that contribute to the fight against fraud to the financial interests of the EU (OLAF, Eurojust). Attention has been focused on operational and functional cooperation and the importance of building on the experience gained, addressing any weaknesses.

The second session aimed to stimulate debate on judicial review. All the speakers highlighted the need for judicial review of EPPO actions and focused on “who” should carry out this review (a European court, national courts or both), “what” needs to be reviewed, and “when” this review should take place.

In the third session, dedicated to procedural guarantees, emphasis was placed on the fundamental importance of the level of protection of procedural rights and guarantees in OLAF investigations, which is not without weaknesses, and therefore in need of further clarification and strengthening. Legal issues concerning procedural safeguards emerging in OLAF investigations would also apply to EPPO investigations. Most speakers agreed that the added value represented by the institution of European Public Prosecutor’s Office and the powers conferred upon it should not come at the expense of fundamental rights.

The credibility of the European Public Prosecutor and the trust placed in it are based precisely on the strengthening of procedural guarantees. For this reason, too, according to some speakers, the Council’s proposal does not appear to be satisfactory. The compromise needed in order to reach an agreement on the Regulation Establishing the European Public Prosecutor’s Office should not lead to a lessening of guarantees.

The difficulties in reaching an agreed solution are known to all. The use of enhanced cooperation, provided in Article 86 TFEU, might seem a likely solution, but it would still leave open the question of relations with Member States that do not participate in it and it seems that the Luxembourg Presidency still wants to try and find a shared solution. The debate that animated the conference has certainly contributed to a better understanding of the complex and delicate issues discussed.

A heartfelt thanks goes to all those who, with their reflections and speculations, contributed to the success of the event and this publication

Live. Die. Repeat. The ‘Privacy Shield’ deal as ‘Groundhog Day’: endlessly making the same mistakes?

ORIGINAL PUBLISHED ON EU LAW ANALYSIS (Wednesday, 3 February 2016)

by Steve Peers

Love it, hate it, or spend an academic career analysing it, the USA is the best-known country in the world. Yet some of its traditions still puzzle outsiders. One of them, celebrated yesterday, is ‘Groundhog Day’: the myth that the appearance, or non-appearance, of the shadow of an otherwise obscure rodent on February 2nd each year will determine whether or not there will be another six weeks of winter. Outside the USA, Groundhog Day is probably better known as a movie: grumpy Bill Murray keeps repeating the same day, trying to perfect it and woo the lovely Andie MacDowell. Others have borrowed this basic plot. In Edge of Tomorrow, sleazy Tom Cruise keeps repeating the same day, trying to kill aliens and woo the lovely Emily Blunt. In the Doctor Who episode Hell Bent, angry Peter Capaldi keeps repeating the same day, trying to cut through a diamond wall and resurrect the lovely Jenna Coleman.

The basic idea is summed up in the advertising slogan for Edge of Tomorrow: Live. Die. Repeat. Groundhog Day in particular has attracted many interpretations. Of these, the most convincing is that the film’s story is a Buddhist parable: repeated reincarnation until we reach the state of enlightenment, or nirvana.

How does this relate to the new EU/US privacy deal, dubbed ‘Privacy Shield’? Obviously the deal involves the USA, and it was reached yesterday, on Groundhog Day. And it’s a new incarnation of a prior deal: ‘Safe Harbor’, killed last October by the CJEU in the Schrems judgment (discussed here). While the text of the new agreement is not yet available, the initial indication is that it is bound to be killed in turn – unless the CJEU, admittedly an increasingly fickle judicial deity, is willing to go back on its own case law. Goodness knows how many further reincarnations will be necessary before the US and EU can reach enlightenment.

Problems with the deal

The point of the new deal is the same as the old one: to provide a legally secure set of rules for EU/US data transfers, for companies that subscribe to a set of data protection principles. Failing that, it is possible to argue that transfers can be justified by binding corporate rules, by individual consent or (as regards US government access to the data) by a third State’s public interest. But as I as I noted in my blog post on Schrems, these alternatives are untested yet in the CJEU, and are possibly subject to legal challenges of their own. Understandably, businesses would like to make a smooth transition to a new set of legally secure rules. Does the new deal fit the bill?

In the absence of a text, I can’t analyse the new deal much. But here are my first impressions.

According to the CJEU, the main problems with the previous deal were twofold: the extent of mass surveillance in the USA, and the limited judicial redress available to EU citizens as regards such government surveillance. It appears that the new agreement will address the latter issue, but not the former. There will be an ‘ombudsman’ empowered to consider complaints against the US government. While the details are unknown, it’s hard to see how this new institution could address the CJEU’s concerns completely, unless it is given the judicial power to order the blocking and erasure of data, for instance.

Furthermore, there’s no sign that the underlying mass surveillance will be changed. Here, the argument is that the Court of Justice simply misunderstood the US system, or that in any event many EU countries are just as wicked as the USA when it comes to mass surveillance. These arguments are eloquently set out in a barrister’s opinion, summarised in this (paywalled) Financial Times story.

Facebook and the US government disdained to get involved in the Schrems case, and have no doubt repented this at leisure. The assumption here appears to be that they would participate fully in new litigation, and convince the CJEU to see the error of its ways.

How likely is this? It’s undoubtedly true to say that the CJEU gives an increasing impression that it willing to bend the rules, or double up on its own case law, in order to ensure the survival of an increasingly beleaguered EU project. In Pringleand Gauweiler, it agreed with harshly criticized plans to keep monetary union afloat. In Dano and Alimanovic, it qualified its prior case law on EU citizens’ access to benefits, in an attempt to quell growing public concern about this issue. In Celaj, it gave a first indication that it would row back on its case law limiting the detention of irregular migrants, perhaps in light of the migration and refugee crisis. The drafters of the proposed deal on UK renegotiation appear to assume that the Court would back away from even more free movement case law, if it appears necessary to keep the UK from leaving the European Union.

Once the Court reminded legal observers of Rome: the imperial author of uniform codes that would bind a whole continent, upon which the sun would never set. Now it increasingly reminds me of Dunkirk: the centre of a brave and hastily improvised retreat from impending apocalypse, scouring for a beach to fight its last stand. The Court used to straighten every road; now it cuts every corner.

Since the ‘Privacy Shield’ deal faces many litigious critics, it seems virtually certain to end up before the Court before long. Time will tell where the judgment on the deal will fit within the broader sweep of EU jurisprudence.

The draft renegotiation deal: A genuine red card? Tusk’s proposal and national parliaments

ORIGINAL PUBLISHED ON EU LAW ANALYSIS (Wednesday, 3 February 2016)

Dr. Katarzyna Granat, (*)

The Draft Decision of the Heads of State or Government, ‘A New Settlement for the United Kingdom within the European Union’, unveiled by Donald Tusk on February 2 2016 offers the first concrete vision of the changes to enhance the role of national parliaments under the UK’s renegotiation efforts. This note provides an analysis of the suggested changes by contrasting them with the mechanisms currently in force under the Lisbon Treaty.

Tusk’s proposal (Section C, points 2-3) envisions that reasoned opinions of national parliaments issued under Article 7.1 of Protocol No. 2 ‘on the application of the principles of subsidiarity and proportionality’ should be ‘duly taken into account’ by all institutions participating in the EU decision-making procedures. In Tusk’s proposal national parliaments may submit reasoned opinions stating that an EU draft legislative act violates the principle of subsidiarity submitted within 12 weeks from the transmission of that draft. If these reasoned opinions represent more than 55% of votes allocated to national parliaments (i.e. at least 31 of the 56 available votes; two votes for each national parliament; in the case of a bicameral parliament, each of the two chambers has one vote; votes of parliaments of member states not participating in the adoption of the act at stake are not counted), the opinions will be ‘comprehensively discussed’ in the Council. If the EU draft legislative proposal is not changed in a way reflecting the concerns of national parliaments in their reasoned opinions, the Council will discontinue the consideration of that draft.

This proposal differs from the current ‘yellow’ and ‘orange’ card schemes of the Lisbon Treaty in a number of ways concerning in particular the timeframe, applicable thresholds and the effects of these procedures.

First, under the existing provisions of the Lisbon Treaty national parliaments may submit a reasoned opinion to the Commission, EP and Council within eight weeks from the transmission of the draft legislative act (Art. 6 of Protocol No.2). Tusk’s proposal hence gives national parliaments more time for the analysis of proposals and drafting reasoned opinions. The need to extend the submission deadline is often underlined by national parliaments and this would probably be welcomed by them. (See COSAC, 24th Bi-annual Report: Developments in European Union Procedures and Practices Relevant to Parliamentary Scrutiny, 4.11.2015 at 22) Yet, it is unclear whether the extension to 12 weeks under Tusk’s proposal also applies to the ‘yellow’ and ‘orange’ card procedures.

Second, although the mechanism of assignment of votes to national parliaments does not change, Tusk’s proposal offers a different threshold of votes to be met by national parliaments. The ‘yellow card’ provision demands that the reasoned opinions on the non-compliance of a Commission proposal with the principle of subsidiarity represent at least one third of all the votes allocated to the national parliaments. For triggering of the ‘orange card’, applicable only in the ordinary legislative procedure, the reasoned opinions of national parliaments need to represent at least a simple majority of the total number of votes allocated to the national parliaments. In contrast, to activate the procedure proposed by Tusk the necessary threshold is 55% of the votes allocated to national parliaments. Hence out of 56 votes of national parliaments at least 19 are necessary for a ‘yellow card’; at least 29 for an ‘orange card’ and 31 to meet the ‘more than 55%’ threshold in Tusk’s proposal. The new procedure thus requires only slightly more votes than the existing ‘orange card’, which, thus far, has never been triggered successfully.

Third, the most substantial change concerns the consequences of activating the new procedure. The ‘yellow card’ involved consequences that were relatively limited: the Commission had to review the draft and then to decide on whether to maintain, amend or withdraw the draft, giving reasons for its decision (Art. 7.2. of Protocol No. 2). For the ‘orange card’, the Commission had similar choices available, but a decision to maintain the proposal required the Commission to prepare its own reasoned opinion with arguments demonstrating compliance of the act with the subsidiarity principle. The EP and the Council would then decide on the fate of the proposal taking into account the arguments on the principle of subsidiarity expressed by the Commission and by national parliaments. If subsequently 55 % of the Council members or a majority of the votes cast in the EP finds a subsidiarity breach, ‘the legislative proposal shall not be given further consideration’. (Art. 7.3 of Protocol No. 2) By contrast, Tusk’s proposal seems to omit the phase in which the Commission can respond to national parliaments and instead moves directly to the Council, which may decide not to continue the consideration of the proposal, if that is not amended to accommodate the ‘concerns’ expressed by national parliaments. Tusk’s proposal binds stopping of the legislative procedure with whether the requests of national parliaments are met, while the ‘orange card’ provided for discontinuation only if the Council finds a subsidiarity breach.

It is worth noting that important details of the procedure such as who is responsible for amending the proposal and more importantly verifying whether the concerns of national parliaments were addressed are left unspecified. Recall that in its interaction with the national parliaments the Commission has often expressed itself satisfied that the concerns of the parliaments expressed in the reasoned opinions have been addressed by the original proposal. (See House of Lords, European Union Committee, 9th Report of Session 2013-14, para 87) Nevertheless, Tusk’s proposal seems to demand a more active response from EU institutions than the ‘orange card’.

Moreover, one should note that Tusk’s proposal does not grant the national parliaments a veto power on any aspect of a Commission proposal. Tusk’s proposal mentions that the discontinuance of the legislative procedure is conditional on the non-accommodation of the ‘concerns’ expressed in the reasoned opinions, with the ultimate decision taken by the Council, and thereby away from the national parliaments.

One further interesting aspect of Tusk’s proposal is that it refers throughout to reasoned opinions on the non-compliance of proposals with the subsidiarity principle, even though in their exercise of subsidiarity scrutiny under Protocol No. 2 national parliaments often critique issues such as the legal basis, proportionality or the political merits of a proposal, thereby going beyond strict subsidiarity review (See F. Fabbrini, K Granat, ‘“Yellow card, but no foul”: The role of the national parliaments under the subsidiarity protocol and the Commission proposal for an EU regulation on the right to strike (2013) 50 Common Market Law Review, 115–143). The question is whether under Tusk’s proposal such a broad approach would also be adopted in the Council. If so, this might cause difficulties in amending a proposal in a way that properly takes account of all the different aspects raised by national parliaments and in consequence makes it also easier to stop the legislative procedure because of the lack of accommodation of the demands of the parliaments.

A broad reading of Tusk’s proposal would therefore probably be more in line with Cameron’s wish of strengthening national parliaments by allowing a threshold of national parliaments ‘to stop unwanted legislative proposals,’ although Cameron underlined also that the EU must commit to a full implementation of the subsidiarity principle. (Letter of D. Cameron to D. Tusk, 10. November 2015 at 4) A more specific answer to the latter issue might be the proposed draft declaration ‘on a subsidiarity implementation mechanism and a burden reduction implementation mechanism’ obliging the Commission to create a mechanism for the review of existing EU legislation for its compatibility with the subsidiarity and proportionality principles with an aim to provide ‘full implementation’ of subsidiarity. (EUCO 7/16)

Last point: the fact that the tabled proposal demands a discussion in the Council could also mean that depending on the relationship between parliaments and their governments represented in the Council, the ministers might show more or less flexibility with the ‘concerns’ of their national parliaments and whether a consensus on stopping or continuing with the legislative procedure could be achieved.

Finally, recall that the rejected ‘red card’ proposed in the Convention on the Future of Europe aimed at a two-third majority of national parliaments that would require the Commission to withdraw its proposal (CONV 540/03, 6.02.2003, p. 3). In comparison, Tusk’s proposal has a lower threshold and does not imply an immediate stopping of the legislative procedure. It could be hence described as a ‘red card light’ and as way of finding a compromise solution without threatening to disrupt the EU legislative procedure.

(*)  Junior Research Fellow & Marie Curie Fellow, Durham Law School 

(EU and UK) The draft renegotiation deal: EU immigration issues

ORIGINAL PUBLISHED ON EU LAW ANALYSIS (Tuesday, 2 February 2016)

by  Steve Peers

This is the first in a series of blog posts about the draft deal on the renegotiation of the UK’s EU membership, tabled earlier today. I am starting with the critical issue of free movement of EU citizens (often referred to as ‘EU immigration’). Subsequent posts will be on the other substantive issues (competitiveness, Eurozone relations, sovereignty) and on the legal form of the deal.

The draft deal takes the form of six draft legal texts: a Decision of the EU Member States’ Heads of State and Government (the ‘draft Decision’); a Statement of the Heads of State and Government (which consists of a draft Council Decision); a Declaration by the European Council (which consists of the EU Member States’ Heads of State and Government, although when acting collectively they are legally distinct from the European Council): and three declarations by the Commission. Of these, Section D of the draft Decision and two of the Commission declarations relate to immigration issues.

Having said that, the key feature of the draft deal on immigration is the intention to propose amendments to the three main current EU laws. These three laws are: (a) the EU citizens’ Directive, which sets out the main rules on most EU citizens moving to other Member States: (b) the EU Regulation on free movement of workers, which contains some specific rules on workers who move; and (c) theRegulation on social security, which sets out rules on coordination and equal treatment in social security for those who move between Member States.  The draft Decision

All three sets of amendments are to be proposed by the Commission as soon as the main draft Decision enters into force. That will happen (see Section E of the draft Decision) as soon as the UK announces that it will remain a member of the EU (that would only happen, of course, if the UK public vote to remain in the upcoming referendum). The draft deal includes a commitment from the Commission to make these proposals, and from the other Member States to support their adoption in the EU Council (oddly, the latter commitment does not apply to the proposed amendment to the citizens’ Directive, since that proposal is not referred to in the draft Decision).

However, all three proposals are subject to the ‘ordinary legislative procedure’, meaning that they have to be agreed with the European Parliament. It is also possible that their legality would be challenged before the EU Court of Justice. I can’t appraise the political likelihood of the European Parliament approving the proposals, but I will offer some thoughts about possible challenges to their legality if they are agreed.

Unlike some other parts of the draft deal (on the position of non-Eurozone states, and the clarification of ‘ever closer union’), there is no mention of possible future Treaty amendments to give effect to any part of the text dealing with free movement (immigration) issues. It should be kept in mind that the texts are not final, and at least some amendments might be agreed before their formal adoption – which is planned for later in February.

Although the press discussion has focussed on the ‘emergency brake’ in in-work benefits, there are three categories of issues: benefits (including a couple of points besides that emergency brake); the family members of non-EU citizens; and EU citizens who commit criminal offences. I refer back to Cameron’s November 2014 speech on EU immigration issues (which I analysed here) where relevant.

It should be noted that there is no proposed text in the deal on two of the issues which Cameron had raised: removal of job-seekers if they do not find a job within six months, and a requirement to have a job offer before entry. Both these changes would have required a Treaty amendment, in light of the Antonissen judgment of the CJEU.

Benefits

There are three benefits issues in the draft deal: (a) the ‘emergency brake’ for in-work benefits; (b) the export of child benefit; and (c) benefits for those out of work.

‘Emergency brake’ on in-work benefits

Cameron had called for no access to tax credits, housing benefits and social housing for four years for EU citizens, but later signalled his willingness to compromise on this point. The position of non-workers and job-seekers is discussed below; but the position of workers is legally and politically difficult, since the Treaty guarantees them non-discrimination.

In the end, the draft deal suggests not permanent discrimination on this issue, but temporary discrimination on the basis of an ‘emergency brake’. The Commission will propose legislation on this issue, which will provide that the UK (or other Member States) can apply a four-year ban on in-work benefits, subject to substantive and procedural criteria. Procedurally, the rules will say that a Member State will apply to the Council to authorise the ban, which will approve it by a qualified majority on a proposal from the Commission (the European Parliament will have to approve the legislation, but would have no role on deciding if the brake should be pulled). A Commission declaration states the UK qualifies to pull this ban immediately; but there is nothing in the deal to suggest that Member States – who would have the final word – also agree. As I have already pointed out, there is no legal requirement in EU law that the legislation would have to give the final word to the Council, rather than the UK itself. The restrictions would only apply for a certain number of years (the exact number is not yet agreed), and would have to be phased out during that time. It’s not clear how much time would then have to pass before they could be applied again.

On what grounds could the brake be applied? According to the draft Decision, it would apply where: ‘an exceptional situation exists on a scale that affects essential aspects of [a Member State’s] social security system, including the primary purpose of its in-work benefits system, or which leads to difficulties which are serious and liable to persist in its employment market or are putting an excessive pressure on the proper functioning of its public services’.

There’s certainly a widespread perception that one of more of these problems exist in the UK and are caused by the large increase in the number of workers from other Member States in recent years. However, there are two serious problems with the proposed mechanism. Firstly, as Jonathan Portes has argued, objective evidence for this view is lacking. Secondly, while the CJEU has been willing to accept certain limits to free movement rights on the grounds of protecting health systems (see my prior blog post for details), this proposal would have a much more far-reaching impact on non-discrimination for workers. It’s certainly conceivable that by analogy from the Court’s obvious willingness to keep EU monetary union afloat, along with its endorsement of restrictions for non-workers in recent years (see below), it might accept that these plans do not violate the Treaties. But as EU currently stands, that is probably a long shot.

Export of child benefit

Cameron sought to end payment of child benefit to children living in other Member States. This payment is provided for in the EU social security coordination Regulation, which would have to be amended to change those rules. There was a strong argument that the plan would have breached the Treaties, since in the case of Pinna the CJEU struck down EU legislation that allowed Member States not to export such benefits at all as a breach of the rules on free movement of workers.

The draft deal does not go as far as Cameron wanted: instead child benefit can be limited by indexing it to the standard of living in the receiving State. It’s an open question whether this would breach the Treaties, since there is no case law on the point.

Benefits for those out of work

Cameron sought to end social assistance for job-seekers. The EU legislation already rules out social assistance for job-seekers, so this reflects the status quo. Although the CJEU has said that job-seekers have a right to access benefits linked to labour market participation, if they have a link already with the labour market in question, it took a narrow view of this rule in the judgment in Alimanovic. Pure benefit tourists (who have never had work in the host State) are not entitled to benefits, according to the judgment in Dano. So the draft Decision simply reiterates this case law, which has already satisfied Cameron’s main objectives in this field.

EU citizens’ family members

Under the EU citizens’ Directive, currently EU citizens can bring with them to another Member State their spouse or partner, the children of both (or either) who are under 21 or dependent, and the dependent parents of either. This applies regardless of whether the family members are EU citizens or not. No further conditions are possible, besides the prospect of a refusal of entry (or subsequent expulsion) on grounds of public policy, public security or public health (on which, see below).

In principle EU law does not apply to UK citizens who wish to bring non-EU family members to the UK, so the UK is free to put in place restrictive rules in those cases (which it has done, as regards income requirements and language rules). However, the CJEU has ruled that UK citizens can move to another Member State and be joined by non-EU family members there, under the more generous rules in the EU legislation. Then they can move back to the UK with their family members, now invoking the free movement rights in the Treaties. In 2014, the CJEU clarified two points about this scenario (as discussed by Chiara Berneri here): (a) it was necessary to spend at least three months in the host Member State exercising EU law rights and residing with the family member, before coming back; and (b) the EU citizens’ Directive applied by analogy to govern the situation of UK citizens who return with their family members.

In his 2014 speech, David Cameron announced his desire to end all distinction between EU citizens and UK citizens as regards admission of non-EU family members, by allowing the UK to impose upon the EU citizens the same strict conditions that apply to UK citizens. Since this would have deterred the free movement of those EU citizens who have non-EU family members, there is a good change that it would have required not just a legislative amendment but a Treaty change.  (Note that according to the CJEU, EU free movement law does not just require the abolition of discrimination between UK and other EU citizens, but also the abolition of non-discriminatory ‘obstacles’ to free movement).

However, the draft deal does not go this far. The main draft decision states that: ‘In accordance with Union law, Member States are able to take action to prevent abuse of rights or fraud, such as the presentation of forged documents, and address cases of contracting or maintaining of marriages of convenience with third country nationals for the purpose of making use of free movement as a route for regularising unlawful stay in a Member State or for bypassing national immigration rules applying to third country nationals.’

The Commission Declaration then states that it will make a proposal to amend the citizens’ Directive: ‘to exclude, from the scope of free movement rights, third country nationals who had no prior lawful residence in a Member State before marrying a Union citizen or who marry a Union citizen only after the Union citizen has established residence in the host Member State. Accordingly, in such cases, the host Member State’s immigration law will apply to the third country national.’

That Declaration also states that the Commission will clarify that: ‘Member States can address specific cases of abuse of free movement rights by Union citizens returning to their Member State of nationality with a non-EU family member where residence in the host Member State has not been sufficiently genuine to create or strengthen family life and had the purpose of evading the application of national immigration rules’; and ‘The concept of marriage of convenience – which is not protected under Union law – also covers a marriage which is maintained for the purpose of enjoying a right of residence by a family member who is not a national of a Member State.’

It seems clear that these ‘clarifications’ will not be included in the legislative proposal, since the declaration later concludes (emphasis added): ‘These clarifications will be developed in a Communication providing guidelines on the application of Union law on the free movement of Union citizens.’

Let’s examine the planned legislative amendments, then the ‘clarifications’.

The proposed amendments would exclude two separate categories of non-EU citizens from the scope of the citizens’ Directive: those who did not have prior lawful residence in a Member State before marrying an EU citizen who has moved to another Member State; and those who marry such an EU citizen after he or she has moved to a Member State. It’s possible to fall into both categories; the first category will exclusively apply to those who got married while an EU citizen lived in a non-EU state, or those who got married in an EU State even though the non-EU citizen was not lawfully resident there. For these people, national immigration law will apply.

The background to this proposal is CJEU case law. In 2003, in the judgment in Akrich, the CJEU ruled that Member States could insist that non-EU family members had previously been lawfully resident in the Member State concerned (previously no such rule appeared to exist). But in 2008, in Metock, the CJEU overturned this ruling and said that a prior legal residence requirement was not allowed.

Several points arise. First, the basic definition: what is lawful residence exactly? Presumably it means more than lawful presence, ie a stay of three months on the basis of a valid visa or visa waiver. But what about ambiguous cases, such as a pending asylum application or appeal? EU legislation says that asylum-seekers can usually stay until the application fails (if it fails), and then during the appeal (subject to some big exceptions). According to the CJEU, the EU’s main rules on irregular migrants therefore don’t apply to asylum-seekers whose application is pending.

Secondly, it’s odd to refer to national law alone, since sometimes EU law governs the admission of non-EU nationals. Even the UK (along with Ireland) is bound by the first-phase EU asylum law, and by the EU/Turkey association agreement.  Denmark is bound by the latter treaty. And all other Member States are bound by the second-phase asylum law, along with EU legislation on admission of students and researchers and some categories of labour migrants (the highly-skilled,seasonal workers and intra-corporate transferees).

Thirdly, it’s arguable that the EU principle of non-discrimination applies. That would mean, for instance, that if a German woman already in the UK married her American husband, the UK would have to treat her the same as a British woman in the same situation – but no worse. This would in fact be relevant to every Member State – there’s nothing in this part of the proposal that limits its application to the UK.

Finally, the consequences of the rule need to be clearer. Does the exclusion from the scope of the Directive mean that the family member is excluded forever from the scope of the citizens’ Directive – even if the person concerned is admitted pursuant to national immigration law? That would mean that national immigration law (or EU immigration legislation, in some cases) would continue to govern issues such as the family member’s access to employment or benefits, or subsequent permanent residence. It’s also not clear what happen to children such as the step-child of the EU citizen, or a child that was born to the EU and non-EU citizen couple while living in a third country.

Could this legislative amendment violate the EU Treaties? In its judgment in Metock, the Court referred almost entirely to the wording of the citizens’ Directive. It mainly referred to the Treaties when concluding that the EU had the competenceto regulate the status of EU citizens’ third-country national family members. But it also referred to the Treaty objective of creating an ‘internal market’, as well as the ‘serious obstruct[ion]’ to the exercise of freedoms guaranteed by the Treaty, if EU citizens could not lead a ‘normal family life’. It must therefore be concluded that there is some possibility that the revised rules would be invalid for breach of EU free movement law.

Would the amendment violate the EU Charter right to family life? That’s unlikely. While the right to family life is often invoked to prevent expulsions of family members, the case law of the European Court of Human Rights gives great leeway to Member States to refuse admission of family members, on the grounds that the family could always live ‘elsewhere’ – as the CJEU has itself acknowledged (EP v Council). There is some possibility, though, that the CJEU would be reluctant to follow that case law (EP v Council concerns families entirely consisting of non-EU nationals) in the context of free movement: the idea that you could go away and enjoy your family life somewhere else is antithetical to the logic of free movement.

As for the ‘clarifications’ in future guidelines, they will of course not be binding. They first of all refer to cases where an EU citizen has moved to another Member State and come back to the home State (known in the UK as the Surinder Singh route). The definition of what constitutes a ‘sufficiently genuine’ move to another country is set out in the case law (three months’ stay with a family member) and mere guidelines cannot overturn this.

It should be noted that the Surinder Singh case law is in any event derived from the Treaty. This line of case law does not accept that such movement between Member States is an ‘evasion’ of national law – as long as free movement rights are genuinely exercised with a family member for a minimum time. The CJEU also usually assumes (see Metock, for instance) that a ‘marriage of convenience’ cannot apply to cases where there is a genuine relationship, even if an immigration advantage is gained. (The Commission has released guidelines already on the ‘marriage of convenience’ concept: see analysis by Alina Tryfonidou here).

Having said that, the planned legislative changes will complicate the plans of people who wish to move to another Member State with their non-EU family and then move back, since national immigration law will apply to their move to the first Member State. It will be important to see how the legislative amendments address the transitional issues of people who have already moved to a host Member State before the new rules apply. Can the home Member State say that those families must now obtain lawful residence in the host State for the non-EU family member, before the non-EU family member can come to the home State?

Criminality and free movement law

The Treaties allow for the refusal or entry or expulsion of EU citizens on ‘grounds of public policy, public security or public health’. The citizens’ Directive sets out detailed substantive and procedural rules on this issue, which has been the subject of considerable CJEU case law.

What would the renegotiation deal do? First of all, the draft decision states that: ‘Member States may also take the necessary restrictive measures to protect themselves against individuals whose personal conduct is likely to represent a genuine and serious threat to public policy or security. In determining whether the conduct of an individual poses a present threat to public policy or security, Member States may take into account past conduct of the individual concerned and the threat may not always need to be imminent. Even in the absence of a previous criminal conviction, Member States may act on preventative grounds, so long as they are specific to the individual concerned.’

To this end, the Commission declaration states that it will: ‘also clarify that Member States may take into account past conduct of an individual in the determination of whether a Union citizen’s conduct poses a “present” threat to public policy or security. They may act on grounds of public policy or public security even in the absence of a previous criminal conviction on preventative grounds but specific to the individual concerned. The Commission will also clarify the notions of “serious grounds of public policy or public security” and “imperative grounds of public security” [grounds for expelling people who have resided for longer periods in a host Member State].  Moreover, on the occasion of a future revision of [the citizens’ Directive], the Commission will examine the thresholds to which these notions are connected.’

It’s not clear whether the revision of the Directive referred to at the end here will be as imminent as the planned proposal to amend the rules on a ‘prior lawful residence’ rule for non-EU family members. Otherwise the plan to issue guidelines is clearly not binding. The language on these guidelines partly reflects the existing law, but some features are new: the greater emphasis on past conduct, the lesser need to show that a threat is imminent and the possibility of expelling someone as a ‘preventative’ measure.

These changes fall within the scope of Cameron’s desire to have ‘stronger measures to deport EU criminals’. However, it should be noted that there is no specific reference to his plans for ‘tougher and longer re-entry bans for foreign rough sleepers, beggars and fraudsters’. While a conviction and re-entry ban for fraud might be covered by the guidelines referred to above, there’s no mention of clarifying entry bans as regards those guidelines, or changing the legislation on this issue. Also, as I noted in my comments on Cameron’s plans at the time, EU legislation does not allow for re-entry bans for rough sleepers and beggars, since the EU citizens’ Directive states unambiguously that a ban on entry cannot be imposed where a person was expelled for grounds other than public policy, public security and public health.

Longer waiting periods for free movement of persons from new Member States

Finally, it should be noted that the draft Decision briefly refers to Cameron’s plan to have longer waiting periods for free movement of persons in future accession treaties. It does not incorporate his suggestion, but merely notes it. However, since the details of each new Member State’s adaptation to EU law are set out in each accession treaty, which has to be approved by each Member State, the UK can simply veto any future accession treaties unless longer waiting periods for free movement are indeed included. The next accession to the EU is at least four years away, probably more. So nothing really turns on the absence of agreement with the UK’s position for now.

Conclusion

How to appraise the planned changes to free movement law? The most fervent supporters of the EU are likely to see some or all of them as a betrayal of the EU’s principles that should never be tolerated. But the departure of a large Member State is liable to do far greater damage to the EU’s integration project than acceptance of these changes ever would.

The changes, if they are all implemented as planned, would fall short of afundamental change in the UK’s relationship with the EU. But equally it is clearly wrong to say that they mean nothing – if in fact they are implemented. The changes would be modest but significant: amendments to three key pieces of EU legislation that would for the first time roll back EU free movement law, not extend it. Leaving aside the calls for non-binding guidelines, there would be cutbacks in in-work benefits (albeit for a limited period), significantly more control on the admission of non-EU family members of EU citizens, and more limited export of child benefit.

The plans not only raise questions of interpretation (although most legislative reforms do that), but of political and legal feasibility: the Commission is willing to propose them and the Member States support two of them, but do Member States support the third proposal – and the UK’s intention to pull the ‘emergency brake’? Will the European Parliament support any of them? Which of them would get past the CJEU? My assessment, as detailed above, is that the amendments on family members will probably be acceptable; the child benefit reforms are an open question; and the changes on in-work benefits are highly vulnerable.

Others may reach a different legal conclusion, of course. And British voters will also be making an assessment not only of the rest of the renegotiation package, but also on the broader pros and cons of EU membership.  These changes go nowhere near far enough for the EU’s strongest critics, but much too far for its biggest admirers. Time will soon tell whether the British public believes that they are a reasonable compromise.

Barnard & Peers: chapter 13

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Labels: benefits, Brexit, David Cameron, emergency brake, EU citizenship, EU reform, expulsion,family reunion, free movement of persons, free movement of workers, UK renegotiation

Surveillance de masse : un coup d’arrêt aux dérives de la lutte antiterroriste (CEDH, Szabo et Vissy c. Hongrie, 12 janvier 2016

ORIIAL PUBLISHED ON CDRE SITE (30 JANVIER 2016)

 by Sylvie Peyrou, CDRE

A l’heure où la lutte contre le terrorisme suscite nombre de réactions sécuritaires parmi les démocraties occidentales, et en particulier européennes (est-il besoin de citer l’exemple français, de la controversée loi sur le renseignement à l’état d’urgence ?), la Cour européenne des droits de l’homme semble garder le cap d’une stricte protection des droits fondamentaux.

L’arrêt de la Cour du 12 janvier 2016, Szabo et Vissy c. Hongrie (Req. n° 37138/14), en est une illustration récente et topique. Cet arrêt attire d’autant plus l’attention que les juges de Strasbourg ont estimé il y a peu dans l’arrêt Sher et autres c. Royaume-Uni (Req. n° 5201/11) que le crime terroriste entrait dans « une catégorie spéciale », justifiant une atténuation des droits au nom de la lutte contre le terrorisme (voir Henri Labayle ici-même). Si l’arrière-fond des affaires est semblable (à savoir des législations restreignant les libertés au profit de la lutte contre le terrorisme), le contexte de chacune d’elles est cependant sensiblement différent, ce qui peut expliquer le souci de la Cour d’adresser un message lui aussi sensiblement différent.

Il s’agissait dans l’affaire Sher de trois pakistanais, suspectés de terrorisme et détenus par les autorités britanniques, qui se plaignaient de la violation du droit à contester la légalité de leur détention (violation alléguée de l’article 5 § 4 CEDH). Dans l’affaire Szabo et Vissy, les requérants sont des ressortissants hongrois, travaillant pour une ONG très critique à l’égard du gouvernement de leur pays, qui se sont plaints notamment de la violation de l’article 8 CEDH (droit au respect de la vie privée et familiale, du domicile et de la correspondance), causée selon eux par la loi hongroise de 2011 relative aux opérations secrètes de surveillance antiterroriste. En effet, une task force spéciale en matière de lutte contre le terrorisme créée en 2011 au sein des forces de police, s’est vu dotée par l’article 7/E de la loi évoquée, de compétences en matière d’opérations secrètes de perquisition et de surveillance de domiciles au moyen d’enregistrements, d’ouverture de lettres et de colis, ainsi que de vérification et d’enregistrement du contenu de communications électroniques et numériques, sans le consentement des personnes concernées (voir le communiqué de presse).

Un recours pour violation de leur droit au respect de la vie privée fut porté par les intéressés à la Cour constitutionnelle hongroise, qui a toutefois estimé que les opérations secrètes de surveillance se justifiaient, car menées à des fins de sécurité nationale. Les requérants se sont alors adressés à la Cour de Strasbourg, arguant de la violation de l’article 8 CEDH. Il est à noter qu’ils ne se plaignaient pas directement d’une mesure de surveillance dont ils auraient fait l’objet, mais, eu égard à l’ampleur et au caractère intrusif de telles mesures, allèguaient du risque potentiel de faire l’objet de mesures injustifiées, dans le cadre d’une législation incitant selon eux aux abus, notamment en l’absence de contrôle juridictionnel.

Si la réponse apportée par la Cour de Strasbourg aux requérants est, somme toute, sans surprise, et suit le schéma de raisonnement classique, son argumentation mérite néanmoins une lecture attentive, qui révèle une étonnante similitude avec celle de la CJUE, à laquelle il est d’ailleurs fait expressément référence.

1. Une solution sans surprise

S’agissant de mesures secrètes de surveillance, la Cour s’est référée à sa très classique jurisprudence Klass c. Allemagne (6 septembre 1978) puis à l’arrêt Roman Zakharov c. Russie (4 décembre 2015, req. n° 47143/06), pour juger qu’une législation permettant de telles mesures affecte directement tous les usagers des services de communication, en instituant un système où toute personne peut voir ses communications interceptées. La Cour note en outre que le droit national n’offre aux intéressés aucune possibilité de recours auprès d’un organe indépendant. Les requérants sont dès lors en droit de se prétendre victimes d’une violation de leurs droits garantis par la Convention, dont ils n’ont pu obtenir réparation en saisissant la Cour constitutionnelle.

Dans un premier temps, la Cour identifie sans difficulté une ingérence dans le droit au respect de la vie privée des requérants, dans la simple existence de la législation incriminée, qui fait peser sur tout un chacun une menace de surveillance. L’essentiel de l’analyse porte dès lors ensuite sur l’objectif visé par ces mesures, qui est de garantir la sécurité nationale, et/ou de prévenir tout désordre ou crime (§ 55). Ce sont donc les conditions que pose l’article 8 § 2 de la Convention qui sont classiquement vérifiées ici. Et tout aussi classiquement, la Cour, face à la mise en balance des intérêts de l’Etat (la protection de la sécurité nationale par la mise en place de mesures de surveillance) et ceux des individus (la protection de leur vie privée), recourt à la notion de « marge d’appréciation » dont disposerait l’Etat.

L’ingérence que constituent les mesures secrètes de surveillance dispose tout d’abord incontestablement d’une base légale, à savoir la loi évoquée de 2011 (loi de 1994 révisée en 2011). La question de la « prévisibilité » de la loi est ensuite examinée avec minutie par la Cour, qui constate que les dispositions législatives sont suffisamment claires pour donner aux citoyens une indication adéquate quant aux circonstances et aux conditions dans lesquelles les autorités publiques peuvent recourir à de telles mesures : prévention et poursuite des actes terroristes, opérations visant à secourir des ressortissants hongrois en détresse à l’étranger (§ 63 de l’arrêt).

La Cour va toutefois examiner plus avant le « risque d’arbitraire » évoqué par les requérants, s’agissant de mesures secrètes de surveillance. Là, son argumentation se fait tout d’abord plus compréhensive envers les exigences étatiques de lutte contre le terrorisme, à l’image notamment de l’arrêtSher évoqué, en soulignant « la nécessité d’éviter une excessive rigidité » des termes de la loi, afin de pouvoir s’adapter aux circonstances. Mais elle constate ensuite qu’il résulte de la loi que toute personne peut virtuellement en Hongrie être soumise à une surveillance secrète, puisque ne sont pas décrites les catégories de personnes qui peuvent voir leurs communications interceptées. Elle juge dès lors une telle disposition comme beaucoup trop large.

La nécessité d’une telle surveillance de masse fait dès lors question, d’autant que le juge constate l’absence de garanties entourant sa mise en œuvre, ou la réparation éventuellement, des mesures contestées. La Cour va donc considérer avec une très grande fermeté que, eu égard au potentiel d’intrusion dans la vie privée des citoyens que représentent les technologies de surveillance de pointe, l’exigence de « nécessité dans une société démocratique » (de l’ingérence considérée) doit être interprétée de façon très stricte (§ 73). Ainsi, une mesure de surveillance secrète doit, de manière générale, être strictement nécessaire à la sauvegarde des institutions démocratiques et, de manière particulière, être strictement nécessaire pour l’obtention d’un renseignement vital lors d’une opération individuelle. Il y aurait, dans le cas contraire, un « abus » par les autorités de ces « redoutables technologies » dont elles disposent (§ 73).

Une objection majeure formulée par la Cour à l’encontre de la législation hongroise est par ailleurs l’absence de contrôle juridictionnel au niveau de l’autorisation ou de la mise en œuvre des mesures critiquées. Le seul « contrôle » existant est de nature politique – il est exercé par le ministre de la justice – ce qui accroît le risque d’abus…La Cour rappelle en effet le principe qui est celui posé notamment par l’arrêt Klass, à savoir celui d’un contrôle juridictionnel, raison pour laquelle la supervision prévue par un membre du pouvoir exécutif n’offre pas les garanties nécessaires.

La Cour cependant se livre à une subtile et très pragmatique analyse, admettant le nécessaire caractère a posteriori d’un tel contrôle juridictionnel en estimant que la mise en œuvre d’une autorisation juridictionnelle n’est pas praticable car, compte tenu de « la nature de la menace terroriste contemporaine », elle serait « contreproductive » ou ferait tout simplement « gaspiller un temps précieux » (voir § 80 de l’arrêt). Quant à une éventuelle procédure de réparation enfin, la Cour note qu’existe simplement une disposition faisant obligation au Ministre de rendre compte deux fois par an à une commission parlementaire, mais ne distingue dans la loi contestée aucune procédure de recours en faveur des personnes soumises à une surveillance secrète, dont, par définition, elles ne sont pas informées…

La Cour de Strasbourg, par le biais de son contrôle de proportionnalité, conclut par conséquent que de telles mesures de surveillance secrète ne répondent pas aux critères de la stricte nécessité qu’exige la préservation des institutions démocratiques. Un tel raisonnement se suffirait à lui seul, et pourtant la Cour a pris soin de faire longuement référence à son homologue de l’UE, ce qui dessine une solution surprenante par sa motivation.

2. Un écho opportun à la jurisprudence de la CJUE

Si les emprunts jurisprudentiels auxquels l’analyste est habituellement confronté vont de Strasbourg vers Luxembourg, force est de constater qu’ici, c’est le juge de la CEDH qui emprunte son raisonnement au juge de l’UE, devenu depuis l’avènement de la Charte des droits fondamentaux de l’UE, le gardien « constitutionnel » de ces derniers.

Face aux problèmes de la surveillance de masse et de la collecte de données y afférente, la Cour EDH, s’interrogeant sur l’existence concomitante de garanties légales assurant le respect des droits des citoyens, fait ici des références réitérées, et singulières, à la jurisprudence de la CJUE. C’est à l’arrêtDigital Rights Ireland (C-293/12 et C-594/12) de cette dernière en effet qu’elle renvoie de façon pertinente. Sont cités notamment les §§ 52 et 62 de l’arrêt de la CJUE, qui exigent la « stricte nécessité » des mesures de rétention des données de communication électroniques organisée par la directive 2006/24/CE, examinée à « la lumière des objectifs poursuivis ». La Cour de Strasbourg fait donc un parallèle implicite entre la rétention de ces données organisée par la directive à des fins de lutte contre le terrorisme et les mesures de surveillance secrète – notamment des communications – mises en place par la législation hongroise aux mêmes fins.

La CJUE a en effet mené dans cet arrêt une réflexion très fine et argumentée sur les métadonnées de communications collectées qui, « prises dans leur ensemble, sont susceptibles de permettre de tirer des conclusions très précises concernant la vie privée des personnes dont les données ont été conservées, telles que les habitudes de la vie quotidienne, les lieux de séjour permanents ou temporaires, les déplacements journaliers ou autres, les activités exercées, les relations sociales de ces personnes et les milieux sociaux fréquentés par celles-ci ».

Ce passage (§ 27 de l’arrêt) cité in extenso par la Cour EDH, permet à cette dernière de souligner l’ampleur des conséquences que peut entraîner la mise en œuvre de telles techniques de surveillance de masse qui – cela va sans dire, et la Cour ne le rappelle d’ailleurs pas explicitement – portent atteinte au droit au respect de la vie privée des personnes. C’est la raison pour laquelle de telles mesures de surveillance doivent être nécessairement accompagnées de garanties légales assurant le respect des droits des citoyens, et doivent par surcroît justifier d’une « stricte nécessité » au regard de la défense des institutions démocratiques.

Il est significatif de noter par ailleurs que la Cour de Strasbourg, outre la jurisprudence Digital Rights Ireland de la CJUE, évoque également la résolution votée par le Parlement européen le 12 mars 2014 concernant « le programme de surveillance de la NSA, les organismes de surveillance dans divers États membres et les incidences sur les droits fondamentaux des citoyens européens et sur la coopération transatlantique en matière de justice et d’affaires intérieures » (P7_TA(2014)0230). Ce sont des passages substantiels qu’elle cite dans son arrêt (§ 25), en particulier et naturellement ceux relatifs à la surveillance de masse et ses conséquences sur les droits fondamentaux, à savoir liberté d’expression, liberté de la presse, respect de la vie privée, protection des données à caractère personnel…autant d’éléments présentés par le Parlement européen comme des piliers de la démocratie, auxquels une telle surveillance de masse porte atteinte. La Cour termine sur la citation relatant le danger de mésusage de telles techniques de collecte et de traitement de données en cas de changement de régime politique (§ 14 de la résolution du Parlement européen)…

Dans un contexte européen où les populismes progressent et les libertés régressent à proportion (en Hongrie précisément par exemple, ou aujourd’hui en Pologne, ce qui a conduit la Commission européenne à lancer pour la première fois la « procédure d’alerte » inventée suite aux problèmes hongrois), cet arrêt sonne comme un avertissement.

Les juges européens semblent en effet unir leurs forces (et comment ne pas lire dans l’arrêt de la Cour EDH un hommage à la jurisprudence de la CJUE, qui illustre selon une modalité inattendue le très commenté « dialogue des juges » ?) afin de construire un vaste espace dédié à la protection des droits fondamentaux. Ceci semble d’autant plus nécessaire que les considérables progrès techniques offrent aux Etats avides d’instaurer des mesures sécuritaires, parées notamment du mérite de la lutte contre le terrorisme, de « redoutables » outils de surveillance des citoyens et de leurs comportements, qui vont bien au-delà du panoptique de Bentham…

 

The Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union: a tool to enhance and protect the rule of law ?

NB This is an intervention during the  Conference “The Shield of Europe: The European Charter of fundamental rights” , European Parliament Brussels 13.01.2016

 By Giuseppe BRONZINI (*)

 (Original Italian – Translated by Yasha MACCANICO)

1. Fifteen years after the European Charter of Fundamental Rights’ proclamation in Nice and six years after its transformation into a text of EU primary law, now may be the right time to rationally assess its impact on the European legal order (covering both the EU institutions and the Member States when acting under the EU Treaties) in order to evaluate the critical tensions it gives rise to, as well as its unfulfilled potential.

First and foremost this could apply to the Charter as an instrument to implement the principle of the rule of law, which is currently under strain at both the supranational level (see the lack of transparency and democracy in EU economic governance) and at the national level, as emerged recently in the Hungarian and Polish cases, which have drawn the attention of the media and the European Commission.[2]

Despite its current limits, which will be discussed in detail, we must recognise that the Charter Project is, to date, the most significant attempt to upgrade the integration process in the European Union (mainly developed previously in the economic sphere) in order to achieve a deep connection between the European Institutions and European citizens through the constitutionalisation of their rights.

The Charter and the new complementary rules in the Treaties now enable the European Institutions, as well as national governments acting within the EU framework, to be legitimated, at least insofar as the substantial aspect of respect for fundamental rights is concerned. The mere fact that now the legitimacy of public action at a supranational level may derive from the safeguard of fundamental rights which, in modern democratic legislatures, is accompanied by the legitimation deriving from (parliamentary) delegation of political will procedures, criteria of accountability for government bodies, mechanisms for direct public discussion and participation for citizens, could be a basis to overcome the current weaknesses of EU action.

Having stated this, we should not forget that the Charter was first conceived in the 2000 Convention as a “Bill of Rights” which, even without a wider constitutional charter, would operate primarily in the judicial field rather than the political arena. However, even in this ancillary position, the Charter has been incorporated into a successful story involving the gradual establishment of an integrated supranational judicial system. Increasing numbers of national judges work directly as guarantors of European law, under the indirect control of the Court of Justice of the European Union, enacting principles envisaged for decades by the European legal order (which render it independent from national self-protection mechanisms). These include the principles of the direct effect and the primacy of EU law, the duty of compliant interpretation of EU law and, when necessary in specific cases, the possibility of not applying national rules and access to preliminary ECJ rulings.

On the latter aspect of preliminary rulings, it appears that the ECJ wants to add a duty to review national judgements which do not comply with supranational law (even by sanctioning non-compliant national judges) and it is even creating “temporary remedies” which were not originally envisaged to protect the lives of defendants while judgements are pending. Such measures demonstrate a clear effort aiming to force rebel or recalcitrant national jurisprudences to abide with EU law.

These are extremely powerful and consolidated tools. Hence, the Charter’s success has been wisely entrusted to the functioning of these typically European remedies which were clearly not created for this purpose, but are now part of the European judges’ toolbox, used on a daily basis by national (local) judges who people turn to in order to obtain justice.

Well, my view, considering the 1999 Simitis Report [3] which settled the institutional base of the codification process, is that the Charter was meant to have four main institutional objectives. Firstly (objectives 1 and 2), to offer visibility and legal certainty to fundamental rights which were previously only protected on a case-by-case basis by the Court of Justice. The third principle was to make these Charter rights autonomous from the judges of the Luxembourg Court, thus fully legitimating it, so that they may not be accused of creating rather than applying EU law anymore. In this sense, the Charter is allowed to act as a real “Bill of Rights”, that is, as a parameter of the substantive legitimacy of European Law (constitutional review) and of national legal systems when they come into contact with it. Fourth, and finally, the Charter was meant to grant an autonomous legal status to social rights to make them equivalent to first- and second-generation fundamental rights, leading to their protection per se, beyond an ancillary rationale which subordinated them to the pursuit of the main economic goals of the integration process, used in past Court of Justice jurisprudence to guarantee them.

The legal doctrine also envisaged a cross fertilizing effect [4] in view of the Charter’s ability to function as a coordination point and as a factor, in the medium term, for convergence between internal and supranational constitutional horizons beyond the  limits imposed by predefined competences, up to the point of issuing judgements for “failure to act” resembling those by the main European Courts. A positive outcome of the Charter was widely attributed to its so-called “inductive effect”, a concept coined by Habermas, as a means of strengthening European citizenship. By acting to preserve this citizenship’s rights, it would have contributed to developing a European public sphere, which would become the foundation for subsequent constitutional development.

2. As far as the visibility of fundamental rights is concerned, it has clearly been achieved during the Charter’s first six years, as has the full legitimation for the Court of Justice to use the semantics of fundamental rights. Continue reading “The Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union: a tool to enhance and protect the rule of law ?”

The ’emergency brake’ on EU citizens’ benefits: Must the Commission or Council control it?

ORIGINAL PUBLISHED ON EU LAW ANALYSIS (Sunday, 31 January 2016)

by Steve Peers,

One issue that has arisen in the UK’s renegotiation of EU membership is the procedure for the UK (or other Member States) invoking an ‘emergency brake’ to limit access to in-work benefits by EU citizens. Should a Member State be able to pull the ‘emergency brake’ on its own initiative (perhaps with a requirement to notify the Commission and Council)? Or should it only be able to make a request to that effect, with the Commission and/or Council deciding on whether to authorise it?

The following analysis demonstrates that there is no legal rule which requires that only the Commission and/or Council can authorise a Member State to pull the emergency brake. Therefore it is a matter of political discretion to decide on who should pull it.

Treaty rules

There is no general rule in the Treaty governing the use of Member States’ safeguards and derogations. The possible limits on free movement rules on grounds of public policy et al refer only to decisions by Member States’ governments, although the EU institutions have the power to adopt legislation on these issues. Similarly, the power to disapply EU law in times of war, threat of war or civil disturbance is invoked by Member States; the Treaty only refers in this case to discussions with the Commission, and a possible special procedure before the Court of Justice. (To keep this text readable for non-lawyers, I have put the precise details of all the laws referred to in an annex.)

On the other hand, there are some Treaty Articles which provide for authorisation for Member States’ action by the Commission (as regards higher national standards following internal market harmonisation), or by the Council (to authorise a state aid which the Commission has ruled out, or to permit a tax rule restricting movement of capital to third countries).

The Treaty provisions most directly relevant to social security and immigration of large numbers of people give the final say to Member States. In particular, if a Member State pulls an ‘emergency brake’ to stop EU decision-making on social security for EU citizens exercising free movement rights, there is discussion in the European Council, but the proposal can ultimately be blocked if there is no agreement there among all Member States. The case law of the CJEU implicitly confirms that if Member States wish to restrict the free movement of EU citizens on grounds of public health, they may do so without being subject to an EU control procedure (Bressol). And the power to control the volumes of non-EU citizens coming from third countries to the EU to work rests entirely with the Member States.

In certain cases, the CJEU has insisted upon a Community (EU) control procedure for Member States’ derogations. But those cases apply to circumstances where the EU both has exclusive competence, and there are Treaty provisions relating to the control procedure. In Commission v UK, the Court relied on the 1972 Act of Accession and the exclusive EU competence over fisheries conservation to justify its conclusion that Member States have ‘special duties of action and abstention’ where the Commission has made proposals to the Council which had not yet been adopted, entailing prior Commission approval of Member State action. In its subsequent judgment in Bulk Oil, the Court essentially confined the Commission v UK judgment to its particular facts.

In Donckerwolke, the Court stated that national measures relating to trade with non-EU countries needed Commission approval. Again, though, this was in light of the exclusive EU competence in the area, and in particular of Article 115 EEC (since repealed), which detailed this process. The exclusive EU powers over these two issues can be distinguished from the shared power over the internal market.

Secondary law

The most relevant provisions in EU secondary legislation tend to give power to Member States to trigger derogations, with at most an information and consultation requirement for the EU institutions. Most significantly, the EU citizens’ Directive leaves it entirely to Member States to trigger the exceptions to EU citizens’ access to benefits. The EU’s patients’ Directive (more on that Directive here) allows Member States to limit reimbursement of costs incurred by patients in other Member States, subject only to a requirement to inform the Commission.

Equally the legislation referring to movements of large numbers of third-country nationals reserves power to Member States. The asylum procedures Directive allows Member States to adopt a longer deadline to decide on asylum applications where there a ‘large number’ of applications, without even a notification requirement. Also, Member States alone decide on whether to derogate from the rules on border procedures in the event of a ‘large number’ of applications at the border or in a transit zone.

Under the Directive on reception conditions for asylum-seekers, Member States may adopt different rules where the normal accommodation to be provided is ‘temporarily exhausted’, with no control requirement. And under the Returns Directive, Member States can derogate from some safeguards on immigration detention if there are an ‘exceptionally large number’ of irregular migrants; but they need only inform the Commission of this decision.

Finally, an example from outside the field of immigration, free movement and social security proves that Member States are often given sole discretion to decide on derogations in other fields of EU law too. The working time Directive provides for four categories of derogations. The first three categories are entirely up to Member States’ discretion. The fourth category, which sets out transitional rules for doctors in training which have now expired, set out rules requiring only a Commission opinion before Member States extended the relevant transitional period.

Of course, secondary EU law is required to comply with EU primary law in the Treaties, and so the lack of EU control procedures over derogations would be invalid if it violated the Treaties. But as discussed in the first part, the Treaties set out no general rule on the EU political institutions’ control of Member States’ derogations from EU law. Indeed, in the particular areas of free movement and social security, they expressly leave the power to decide on such measures to Member States. This is, however, without prejudice to the possibility of judicial control (by the national courts and the CJEU) to determine whether most of these national decisions (except for the ‘emergency brake’ on social security decision-making) have been validly exercised.

 

 

Annex – Articles in Treaty and legislation referred to

Free movement exceptions: Articles 45(3), 52(1), 62 and 65(1) TFEU

Emergency wartime derogation: Article 348 TFEU

Higher national standards following internal market harmonisation: Article 114 TFEU

State aid authorisation: Article 108(2) TFEU

Tax rule restricting movement of capital to third countries: Article 65(4) TFEU

Social security and free movement of persons: Article 48 TFEU

Volumes of third-country nationals coming to work: Article 79(5) TFEU

Fisheries conservation ruling: Case 804/79 Commission v UK, referring to Article 102 of the 1972 Act of Accession (paras 17, 28 and 31 of the judgment)

Case 174/84 Bulk Oil: para 56

EU competences: Articles 3(1) and 4(1)(a) TFEU

EU citizens’ Directive (Directive 2004/38): Article 24

EU’s patients’ Directive (Directive 2011/24): Article 7(9) and (11)

Asylum procedures Directive (Directive 2013/32): Articles 31(3)(b) and 43(3)

Directive on reception conditions for asylum-seekers (Directive 2013/33): Article 18(9)(b)

Returns Directive (Directive 2008/115): Article 18

Working time Directive (Directive 2003/88): Article 17

The EU Humanitarian Admission Scheme for Syrian Refugees in Turkey

ORIGINAL PUBLISHED ON EU LAW ANALYSIS (Sunday, 24 January 2016)

by Laura Robbins-Wright (*)

On 15 December 2015, the European Commission published a recommendation concerning a humanitarian admission scheme for Syrian refugees in Turkey. The recommendation follows a June 2015 decision to implement an intra-EU relocation programme and a scheme of resettlement from third countries. The document also builds on an action plan released in October 2015 and a more recent decision to provide €3 billion for a Refugee Facility that will “coordinate and streamline” the provision of humanitarian assistance to Syrian refugees in Turkey. The recommendation calls for a “rapid, efficient and voluntary scheme” for the “orderly, safe and dignified arrival” of these individuals.

Three aspects of the recommendation stand out and merit further analysis.

First, the Commission noted the importance of demonstrating solidarity with Turkey since the country hosts more than 2.2 million Syrian refugees at present. However, though Turkey hosts the largest absolute number of Syrian refugees, Jordan and Lebanon bear the greatest (relative) responsibility for these refugees. Indeed, whereas Syrian refugees comprise approximately 3 per cent of the total population of Turkey, they make up roughly 10 percent of the population of Jordan and more than 20 per cent of the population of Lebanon. Nevertheless, the recommendation to offer humanitarian admission to refugees from Turkey is perhaps to be expected given that the EU shares a border with Turkey and thousands of refugees have attempted the perilous journey across the Aegean into Greece. Furthermore, Turkey is a candidate for accession to the EU, while Jordan and Lebanon are simply considered to be part of the broader ‘European neighbourhood.’ Though negotiations on Turkish accession opened in 2005 and have proceeded slowly since then, the European Union and Turkey may be in the process of forging a new and more cooperative relationship in migration that could enhance refugee protection and “re-energize” these complex discussions.

Second, the recommendation also emphasises the voluntary nature of participation in the proposed scheme. The Commission indicated that all Member States, plus members of Schengen, are welcome to join the humanitarian admission programme. This approach is consistent with some of the previous intra-EU relocation efforts – namely EUREMA I and II. The decision to offer Member States a choice in participating in this programme is not especially surprising given the challenges the Commission faced in securing the agreement of some Member States on national quotas for the intra-EU relocation programme proposed last summer. In that context, recent media reports indicate that EU Migration Commissioner Dimitri Avromopoulos has acknowledged that “relocation does not work.” This statement is supported through data released on 20 January, 2015 which demonstrate that Member States pledged just over 4,200 places (as opposed to the Commission’s target of 160,000 places) and only 331 individuals have been relocated from Greece and Italy to date.

From a normative perspective, the desire to demonstrate international solidarity aligns with the principle of international cooperation outlined in the preamble to the 1951 Convention. However, this voluntary approach – combined with a clear lack of enthusiasm for the most recent relocation scheme – raises the age-old question of whether the European Union can truly achieve a cohesive approach to humanitarian protection.

Finally, the recommendation is notable for its strategic approach, as embodied in the desire to achieve a “sustainable reduction” in irregular migration from Turkey to the European Union. Since 2003, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) has attempted to reframe resettlement as a strategic instrument for protection that emphasises the direct and indirect benefits of resettlement for refugees, host countries, receiving countries, and the international refugee protection regime. However, the organisation also recognised the importance of ensuring that such programmes do not create a “pull factor” for further migration. The UNHCR suggested that this can be achieved by establishing “clear and transparent” selection criteria. In this case, the Commission has proposed that only those who registered their presence with Turkish officials prior to 29 November, 2015 will be eligible for humanitarian admission. The Commission also recommends that participating countries assess why the individual fled Syria and examine their vulnerability and potential family ties within the European Union, among other criteria.

Though managing this humanitarian admission programme in a strategic manner could encourage Turkey to continue welcoming asylum seekers and also enable some Syrians to benefit from international protection, there are questions as to how Turkey will seek to manage ongoing arrivals. Furthermore, the UNHCR has noted that the decision to offer a durable solution to certain refugees can potentially create “bitterness and resentment” among ineligible groups, particularly in cases where these groups do not have access to effective protection in the host country. This raises questions about how the prospective decision to offer humanitarian protection to Syrian refugees will be perceived by the tens of thousands of Afghan, Iranian, and Iraqi refugees who have long resided in Turkey and may be obliged to wait up to 10 years for a decision on their respective applications for protection.

Though the recommendation offers clear operational guidelines, it does not indicate how many refugees can or should be offered protection through this proposed scheme. Instead, the Commission notes that the number of individuals offered admission should be determined according to UNHCR processing capacity, the number of displaced persons in Turkey, and the impact of efforts to reduce irregular migration to Turkey (a measure that has attracted criticism from the European Council on Refugees and Exiles). Furthermore, the Commission has recommended that participating Member States admit those granted subsidiary protection in an “equitable” manner. However, given the aforementioned challenges the Commission faced in securing Member State agreement on quotas for the intra-EU relocation programme, this could prove more difficult than anticipated. Overall, it remains unclear whether this humanitarian admission programme – if adopted – will have a meaningful impact on the substantial number of Syrian refugees residing in Turkey at present.