THE legal challenge by the Irish Farmers Association to cuts in EU milk quotas reached the European Court of Justice (ECJ) in Luxembourg yesterday.
The IFA contended that between 1987 and 1992, in making permanent a temporary cutback in the Irish milk quota of 4.5 per cent, the Commission had deprived farmers of their legitimate expectation of traditional compensation for loss of a quota.
The case follows one taken by the ICMSA on broadly the same issue which the court ruled against a few months ago. The IFA case was referred to the Luxembourg court by Mr Justice Kinlan in the High Court in 1993.
The IFA also claims the Commission is in breach of the right to private property, that it acted in a discriminatory fashion in failing to follow the practice of compensation, that the measure was disproportionate to the requirements of the market, and that the Commission acted in breach of its own transparency rules in making the cut permanent.
The Commission says it is simply acting in its legally prescribed role as manager of the market and that individual quotas are not to be regarded as private property.
Following yesterday's hearing, the ECJ's Advocate General will give a non binding opinion on the case within a few weeks, followed by a ruling of the full court and the return of the issue to the High Court.
The hearing was attended by the IFA's dairy chairman, Mr Liam Foley, and its deputy president, Mr Michael Slattery, one of the plaintiffs. Also party to the case are Mr Hugh Duffy, Mr Bertie Roche, and Mr Eddie Twomey, of Cos Monaghan, Cork and Galway, respectively. The IFA was represented by Mr John J. O'Hare, solicitor, and by Mr James O'Reilly SC and Mr John Gleeson barrister at law.
