Opinion of Mr Advocate General Mayras

Mr President,

Members of the Court,

The Tribunal de Premiere Instance (Chambre Correctionnelle) (Court of First Instance (Criminal Chamber)), Neufchâteau, before giving judgment in the criminal proceedings before it against Mr Deckmann or Dechmann, the managing partner of a private limited company of the same name and a retail butcher whose premises are situated at Bouillon, has referred a question to this Court for a preliminary ruling on the compatibility of rules on maximum prices unilaterally adopted by the Belgian Government and the fixing of profit margins by Arrêté Ministériel (Ministerial Order) with the provisions of Community agricultural law, in particular those provisions concerning the organization of the market in pigmeat.

In answer to the question put to him by the Court, the defendant stated that the company of which he is the manager also has as one of its objects trade in jambons d'Ardennes (a kind of ham). The company obtains all its supplies of salt provisions, on the hoof or as carcases, in Belgium, and sells almost exclusively through other channels than the butcher's shop belonging to it. By contrast, for the needs of that shop, the butcher buys wholesale, in particular on the neighbouring French market.

As is usual in such a field, in order to enable the national court to protect the rights of those concerned, it will be necessary to compare the Community rules with the national rules. I shall begin with a short statement of the Belgian rules which gave rise to the dispute in the main action.

I —. The Law of 30 July 1971 on economic regulation and prices, amending the Arrêté-Loi of 22 July 1945 concerning prevention of infringements of rules on provisioning the country, enables the minister responsible for economic affairs both to fix maximum prices for all products and foodstuffs, including animals, and to fix the limit of the profit to be made by any vendor or intermediary.

II —. It is open to argument whether the national rules were intended to impose prices to the consumer or whether they were merely intended to control the trends of such prices. Be that as it may, in his defence the defendant entered an objection of illegality against the aforesaid provisions of the Arrêté Ministériel of 27 March 1975, which in his submission is incompatible with Regulation No 121/67/EEC of the Council of 13 June 1967 on. the common organization of the market in pigmeat.

III —. In Case 83/78 Pigs Marketing Board v Redmond, the Court will again have occasion to consider the Community rules in this sector. Let me point out that, following Regulation No 20/62 of the Council on the progressive establishment of a common organization of the market in pigmeat, Regulation No 121/67 introduces the common organization of the market in pigmeat as from 1 July 1967. It was adopted on the same date as several provisions organizing the markets in cereals, eggs and poultrymeat (Regulations Nos 120, 122 and 123/67 of 13 June 1967). In fact the entry into force on 1 July 1967 of the common price for cereals made possible the establishment of a unified market within the Community for pigmeat, poultrymeat and eggs, which are derived products. Therefore what was said of Regulation No 120/67 in the judgment of 23 April 1975 (paragraph 8 of the decision in Case 31/74 Galli [1975] 1 ECR 47, at p. 61) can be transposed to Regulation No 121/67. This common organization of the market is intended, as is emphasized repeatedly in the preamble to the regulation, to create for the Community a single market in pigmeat subject to common administration.

IV —. After Galli came several judgments on which diverse opinions were expressed by commentators and practising lawyers, some of whom maintain that those judgments are a regression made necessary by the fact that even with a complete market organization based on a common price system it is not in the Community's interest to strip the Member States of their powers whilst its own institutions are not yet capable of holding the ground, because this would give rise to a vacuum particularly undesirable in a period of economic and monetary crisis. Thus it is said that the influence of Community law on national economic policies and on the process of integration has been somewhat overestimated, and that instead of complete lack of jurisdiction on the part of the Member States one should speak of possible incompatibility or risk of incompatibility between national rules and the provisions of Community agricultural law.

V —. However, subsequent case-law seems to have softened somewhat any excessively apodictic aspects of paragraph 27 of the decision in Galli (which bears a certain resemblance to paragraph 20 of the decision in Case 48/74 Charmasson [1974] 2 ECR 1383, at p. 1395, judgment of 10 December 1974).

VI —. However, although the effects of national rules such as those at issue in this case are likely to be passed up the line by degrees to wholesale prices and production prices, I admit that in law it is difficult to prove this and to show that such rules do in fact constitute a measure having an effect equivalent to a quantitative restriction on imports, the prohibition of which must be enforced by the national court on its own assessment of the position.

VII —. In conclusion, I should like to attempt a synthesis of the criteria.

In conclusion, I am of the opinion that the Court should rule that:

1 Translated from the French.