Provisions on penalties related to legislation on industrial installations Document on Good Practices October 2011 Project Management This report has been prepared by Milieu Ltd for the European Commission, DG Environment under Study Contract DG ENV № 070307/2010/569468/SER/C3. The views expressed herein are those of the consultants alone and do not necessarily represent the official views of the European Commission. Milieu Ltd. (Belgium), 15 rue Blanche, B-1050 Brussels, tel: +32 2 506 1000; fax: +32 2 514 3603; e-mail: [email protected]; web address: www.milieu.be Project Manager: Claire Dupont Deputy Project Manager: Nathy Rass‐Masson Project Management support was provided by: Bernhard Borsche, Katalin Császár, Gavin McBride and Florent Pelsy Milieu Ltd. (Belgium), 15 rue Blanche, B‐1050, Brussels, tel 32 2 506 1000; fax 32 2 514 3603 ; e‐mail: [email protected] ; web address: www.milieu.be Country experts Denmark – Helle Husum France – Florent Pelsy Germany – Bernhard Borsche Hungary – Katalin Császár Netherlands – Wybe Douma Spain –Florent Pelsy United Kingdom – Gavin McBride Table of Content 1. The different legal and institutional frameworks ........................................................ 14 1.1. Overall legal framework........................................................................................................ 14 1.2. Competent Authorities.......................................................................................................... 15 2. Effectiveness, proportionality and dissuasiveness ....................................................... 16 3. The sanctioning system................................................................................................... 19 3.1. The nature of the sanctions.................................................................................................... 19 3.1.1. Administrative versus criminal sanctions...................................................................... 19 3.1.2. Criteria for starting a criminal procedure ...................................................................... 22 3.1.3. Synergies between administrative and criminal sanctions ............................................ 24 3.2. The range of sanctions........................................................................................................... 26 3.2.1. Fines and imprisonment ................................................................................................ 26 3.2.2. Other measures and/or sanctions................................................................................... 35 3.3. Criteria used to determine the severity of the sanctions........................................................ 40 3.4. The importance of publicity .................................................................................................. 44 4. Enforcement and sanctioning procedure...................................................................... 46 4.1. The inspection....................................................................................................................... 46 4.1.1. Frequency of inspections............................................................................................... 46 4.1.2. Rights and obligations of the inspectors........................................................................ 47 4.2. The national judicial systems ................................................................................................ 49 4.2.1. The different actors of the procedure ............................................................................ 49 4.2.2. The criminal proceedings.............................................................................................. 51 4.2.3. Public Access to Justice................................................................................................. 52 5. Existence of guidance...................................................................................................... 55 Tables Table 1: Key enforceable provisions of the IPPC Directive ................................................................. 11 Table 2: Key obligations and relevant provisions of the IPPC Directive.............................................. 12 Table 3: Overview of key characteristics of the selected Member States ............................................. 14 Table 4: Competent Authorities in the seven selected Member States ................................................. 15 Table 5: Administrative penalties.......................................................................................................... 27 Table 6: Overview of administrative (quasi) criminal and criminal sanctions...................................... 28 Table 7: Overview of maximum sanctions............................................................................................ 33 Table 8: Overview of administrative measures and sanctions other than fines..................................... 36 Table 9: Rights and obligations of inspectors ....................................................................................... 48 Figures Figure 1 Inspection and enforcement strategy of the province of Overijssel........................................ 22 Annex I - Detailed review of sanctions and procedures applicable to breaches of the legislation on industrial emissions in seven selected countries Abbreviations BAT Best Available Technique CA Competent Authority DEFRA Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs DKK Danish Krone EC European Community ECHR European Court of Human Rights ELV Emission Limit Value EPR Environmental Permitting Regulations EU European Union EUFJE European Union Forum of Judges for the Environment IMPEL Implementation and Enforcement of Environmental Law IPPC Integrated Pollution Prevention and Control LBRO Local Better Regulation Office Ltd. Limited Company Opra Operational Risk Appraisal ORO Offence Response Options Plc. Public Limited Company UK United Kingdom Document on Good Practices Introduction This document is primarily informative. It aims at presenting the enforcement procedures and sanctions in place in Member States for infringement of legislation on industrial emissions, with a focus on legislation transposing the Directive 2008/1/EC concerning integrated pollution prevention and control (the IPPC Directive),1 and to identify “good practices” in this field. Good practices are to be understood as examples of successful approaches to enforcement. This relates in particular to the different elements of the sanctioning system, both in terms of enforcement procedure and sanctions. Throughout the document, the term “sanction” is used as covering financial and imprisonment penalties but also other measures such as confiscation, closure of an installation used for enforcement purposes. The objective is to support the Member States in implementing their legislation on industrial emissions and in elaborating their own sanctioning strategies. The document also clarifies how Member States interpret the notions of dissuasiveness, proportionality and effectiveness. In order to ensure operators of the installations covered by this Directive comply with the EU requirements, it is crucial that the national transposing legislation provides adequate enforcement mechanisms, including penalties that are effective, proportionate and dissuasive. The requirement for Member States to determine penalties is explicitly stated in most of the directives related to industrial emission.2 Although the IPPC Directive does not contain such an explicit provision, Article 14 requires “Member States to take the necessary measures to ensure that the conditions of the permit are complied with by the operator when operating the installations”. Article 79 of the new Directive 2010/75/EC on industrial emissions place on Member States an obligation “to determine penalties applicable to infringements of the national provisions adopted pursuant to this Directive”. It also prescribes that “the penalties thus provided for shall be effective, proportionate and dissuasive”. The Court of Justice of the European Union has held that although the Treaty leaves Member States to choose the ways and means of ensuring that a directive is implemented, that freedom does not affect the obligation imposed on all Member States to which the directive is addressed, to adopt, in their national legal systems, all the measures necessary to ensure that the directive is fully effective, in accordance with the objective which it pursues. Furthermore, according to the established case-law of the Court of Justice of the European Union relating to Article 10 EC Treaty, now Article 4(3) of the Treaty on the European Union,3 whilst the choice of penalties remains within their discretion, Member States must ensure in particular that infringements of EU law are penalised under conditions, both procedural and substantive, which are 1 Directive 2008/1/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 15 January 2008 concerning integrated pollution prevention and control (Codified version). Official Journal L 024, 29/01/2008 P. 0008 – 0029. 2 These are: Council Directive 1999/13/EC of 11 March 1999 on the limitation of emissions of volatile organic compounds due to the use of organic solvents in certain activities and installations, Official Journal L 85, 29.3.1999.p.1. Directive 2001/80/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 23 October 2001 on the limitation of emissions