20 October, 2021 20 October, 2021Judgement of the Court (First Chamber) of October 6th, 2021 Scandlines Danmark Aps. and Scandlines Deutschland Gmbh V. Commission, in Joined Cases C 174/19 P And C 175/19 P. Article 107(1) TFEU does not distinguish between the causes or the objectives of State aid, but defines them in relation to their effects. The fact that a Member State assigns a public service subject to a legal monopoly to a public undertaking does not, in certain circumstances, entail a distortion of competition. An advantage granted to the operator of an infrastructure subject to a legal monopoly cannot, in such circumstances, distort competition. It is necessary, for such a distortion to be able to be excluded in such circumstances, that the legal monopoly not only excludes competition ‘on’ the market, but also ‘for’ the market, in that it excludes any possible competition to become the exclusive provider of the service in question. For the purpose of assessing the effect on competition of the measures granted to a company there is need to take account of the activities of which that undertaking is itself specifically and actually in charge. (CRM).The case concerns the financing of the project for the Fehmarn Belt link between Denmark and Germany. The project, signed between Denmark and Germany, consists on […]
