Pojęcie „»niedyskryminacyjnego ze względu na koszty« charakteru postępowań sądowych” w świetle wyroku TS UE z dnia 13 lutego 2014 r. w sprawie C-530/11 – komentarz

Case C-530/11 European Commission v United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland concerns the access to justice in environmental matters (the third pillar of the Aarhus Convention). The main issue in this case was the concept of “»not prohibitively expensive« judicial proceeding” in environmental matters. This condition is applied to the judicial proceedings,in which the members of society are the applicants, acting in environmental protection interest. In the judgement, the CJEU presented its interpretation of this condition in favour of the parties of such proceedings. The CJEU analysed the requirements of the EU standard for the costs in judicial proceedings whenever such a proceeding can be qualified as a “proceeding in environmental matters” under the third pillar of the Aarhus Convention. High costs are a hindrance for the members of society in their participation in environmental matters, which weakens social control in the name of this public interest. In the CJEU view, the costs should not create a barrier in access to justice in such judicial proceedings. Consequently, the legislators of Member States have to review the national measures in that regard in order to ensure their consistency with this EU standard for judicial proceedings in environmental matters.