Italië gedaagd voor Hof van Justitie omdat onterecht gegeven staatssteun niet wordt teruggevorderd (en)

Under the rules on the recovery of unlawful state aid, Italy is obliged to take all measures available under its domestic law to secure the immediate and effective enforcement of the Commission decision, and to inform the Commission of the action taken.

A year after the decision, the Commission has not been informed of any steps to recover the aid granted by Italy under Decree-law No 23 of 14 February 2003.

The decision to refer Italy to the Court is in accordance with the strict line that the Commissioner for Competition, Neelie Kroes, is taking with Member States that fail to comply with Commission decisions on state aid.

This is the third time since the beginning of the year that the Commission has decided to take a Member State to court for failure to give effect to a state aid decision. On 19 January it decided to refer Italy to the Court for failure to comply with a decision ordering the recovery of state aid given to public sector companies (see IP/05/76). On 16 January it decided to take similar action against Germany for failure to recover aid granted to the firm Kahla (see IP/05/189).

Background

On 30 March 2004 the Commission adopted a Decision finding that an Italian scheme providing for grants and some reductions in social security contributions was not compatible with the state aid rules.

The scheme aimed at safeguarding jobs in large companies in difficulty that were subject to a specific Italian insolvency proceeding (amministrazione straordinaria) and had more than 1 000 employees. If such companies were sold there were incentives for a purchaser who agreed to go on employing the staff of the old company, up to a ceiling of 550.

The Commission investigated the case and concluded that the scheme could not be approved under any of the rules allowing state aid in the European Union, such as the guidelines on rescuing and restructuring firms in difficulties, which would permit aid for SMEs only. Italy was accordingly asked to recover all the aid already granted under the scheme.