Opinion of Mr Advocate General Darmon delivered on 14 January 1987. # Commission of the European Communities v Italian Republic. # Failure of a Member State to fufil its obligations - Failure to implement directives. # Case 361/85.

Opinion of the Advocate-General

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Mr President

Members of the Court,

1 . The Italian Government does not contest the failure to fulfil its obligations with which it is charged in these proceedings .

Council Directive 79/373 and Commission Directives 80/509, 80/511 and 80/695 deal with the harmonization of national legislation applying to the marketing of compound feedingstuffs . The period prescribed for incorporating those directives into national law expired on 1 January 1981, the Member States being under a duty to inform the Commission forthwith of the measures taken to that end .

To date, as the representative of the Italian Government confirmed at the hearing, the legal instrument implementing those directives in Italy has still not been adopted .

2 . According to an established line of cases of the Court,

"the governments of the Member States participate in the preparatory work for directives and must therefore be in a position to prepare, within the period prescribed, the draft legislative provisions necessary for their implementation ". ( 1 )

3 . I therefore propose that the Court should :

( 1 ) Declare that by failing to transpose the provisions of the aforesaid directives into national law, the Italian Republic has failed to fulfil the obligations set out in Articles 5 and 189 of the EEC Treaty;

( 2 ) Order the defendant to pay the costs .

(*) Translated from the French .

( 1 ) Judgments of 12 October 1982 in Cases 136, 148, 149 and 151/81 (( 1982 )) ECR 3547,3555, 3565 and 3573 .