| | ECT-5Legality and proportionality    
| ECT | Article 5 | The Community shall act within the limits of the powers conferred upon it by this Treaty and of the objectives assigned to it therein.
In areas which do not fall within its exclusive competence, the Community shall take action, in accordance with the principle of subsidiarity, only if and in so far as the objectives of the proposed action cannot be sufficiently achieved by the Member States and can therefore, by reason of the scale or effects of the proposed action, be better achieved by the Community.
Any action by the Community shall not go beyond what is necessary to achieve the objectives of this Treaty. |
| Case | Pte | Ref | Text | C-337/05
Italy | 42-44 | ECT-5-impl | 42. It should be noted at the outset that measures adopted by the Member States in connection with the legitimate requirements of national interest are not excluded in their entirety from the application of Community law solely because they are taken in the interests of public security or national defence (see, to that effect, Case C186/01 Dory [2003] ECR I2479, paragraph 30).
43. As the Court has already held, the Treaty provides for derogations applicable in situations which may involve public safety, in particular, in Articles 30 EC, 39 EC, 46 EC, 58 EC, 64 EC, 296 EC and 297 EC, which deal with exceptional and clearly defined cases. It cannot be inferred from those articles that the Treaty contains an inherent general exception excluding all measures taken for reasons of public security from the scope of Community law. The recognition of the existence of such an exception, regardless of the specific requirements laid down by the Treaty, would be liable to impair the binding nature of Community law and its uniform application (see, to that effect, Case 222/84 Johnston [1986] ECR 1651, paragraph 26; Case C273/97 Sirdar [1999] ECR I7403, paragraph 16; Case C285/98 Kreil [2000] ECR I69, paragraph 16; and Dory , cited above, paragraph 31).
44. In that regard, it is for the Member State which seeks to rely on those exceptions to furnish evidence that the exemptions in question do not go beyond the limits of such exceptional cases (see, to that effect, Case C414/97 Commission v Spain [1999] ECR I5585, paragraph 22). |
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