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On 4 July 2000, the European Court of Justice (ECJ) imposed the first-ever daily penalty payments on Greece for failure to enforce a previous judgement in an environmental case.
Daily penalties were introduced by the Maastricht Treaty, but had never been used. Falling in with a European Commission proposal, the ECJ ordered Greece to pay a daily penalty of 20,000 euros from 4 July until such time as it complies with the 1992 ruling against it. Greece has been ignoring the Court's finding that the Greek authorities had failed to take the necessary steps to eliminate toxic and dangerous waste in the Chania region in breach of obligations laid down in two Community Directives of 1978 and 1979. On discovering the contravention, the European Commission asked the Greek government to put itself in order. When it failed to comply, the Commission started fresh infringement proceedings against it in 1995 for failure to apply a judgement of the Court.
The ECJ did not rule on the strict law of the case, but looked at the actual situation in the field. It found that uncontrolled tipping of waste was being carried out at the mouth of the Kouroupitos river, 200 metres from the sea in the Chania prefecture of Crete. Two similar cases are currently pending before the Court, where the Commission is again asking for daily penalty payments. One is against France (on night work by women), the other against Greece again, over recognition of diplomas.
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