ECJ: Access to Harmonised Standards for All

Mar 22, 2024 Benn-Ibler Rechtsanwälte

A recent European Court of Justice (ECJ) ruling has caused uncertainty. EU standards, which define how products should work, fall under EU law. Therefore, they must be freely and publicly available to EU citizens. The implications of the ruling could be significant for the economy and are uncertain at this stage.

HTM standards, or harmonised technical standards, are a special category of European standards developed by a European standards body on behalf of the European Commission. Companies demonstrate that their products or services meet the technical requirements of relevant EU legislation by complying with harmonised standards. The use of harmonised standards is usually voluntary, whereas technical requirements in EU legislation are mandatory.

In its judgment, the ECJ has now ruled that these HTM standards, specifically those relating to toy safety, should be considered to form part of EU law. The legal consequence of this decision is that all EU citizens must have free access to these harmonised standards via Art. 2 of the Regulation on public access to EU documents.

The ECJ based its opinion on the principle of the rule of law and stated that citizens need to be aware of such harmonised standards in order to be able to clearly identify their rights and obligations.

The industrial and scientific organisations which had previously carried out these standardisation processes were financed by selling HTNs to users.

The new ECJ ruling eliminates this funding option. There are now fears on the part of the business community that the associations will cease their work and that the standardisation system will collapse.

ECJ, C-588/21 P (5 March 2024)