Nunn-Price NCELEX: Improving Access to Community Legislation
Journal of Information, Law and Technology
CELEX:
Improving access to Community legislation
and its transposition into national law.
Norman Nunn-Price
Database Director
Context Ltd
This is an Information Paper published on 31 October 1997.
Citation: Nunn-Price N, 'CELEX: Improving access Community Legislation and its Transposition into National Law.’, Information Paper (3) The Journal of Information, Law and Technology JILT). <
This study was carried out under contract No. 1440 from the European Commission by Context Ltd ( Norman Nunn-Price) and the Buro fur Grundlagenforschung und Systemplanung ( Dr Werner Robert Svoboda).
1. The Current Situation
This study completed a comprehensive survey of the legal database services in the member states of the European Union with the addition of Norway and Switzerland. In particular it identified those services which contained or intended to contain, the full text of the national implementing measures for EU legislation.
All the member states of the EU, except for Ireland have operational online databases which cover their own national law comprehensively. In every country, except Luxembourg, there is at least one database which contains the full text of the national legislation. Thus the situation in the EU is such that it is perfectly feasible to search for the national implementations of EU legislation within any particular member state. A list of these national legislative online databases is shown in Figure 1. A further list of those which are available off-line i.e. on CD-ROM is shown in Figure 2.
2. CELEX
There are a number of options for accessing CELEX itself. These include:-
(a) direct access to CELEX on the EU’s own computing centre in Luxembourg
- by the information officers within the Institutions of the EU
- by privileged external users such as Universities via the EUROBASES service of the Office for Official Publications (EUR-OP)
- by the official gateways newly set up in each member state
(b) access to the derived versions of CELEX licensed by EUR-OP and available as
- online versions
- CD-ROM versions
The official gateways are relatively recent developments so there is, as yet, only limited experience of their effectiveness. In 1996 the total connect time by gateway users was 3,413 hours which is about 5% of the external online usage of CELEX on the Luxembourg machine.
In 1996 there were 19 licencees of the CELEX data who have built their own version of CELEX in either online or off-line forms. The licences are set at a reasonable price to encourage dissemination of the data. The result is that the usage of these derived versions of CELEX is at least 5 times that of the external direct access to the original version of CELEX. The study identified 10 commercial online services, 4 public administration online services and 7 CD-ROM suppliers. The CD-ROMs are published in 6 of the official languages of the EU Figure 3 shows the list of online applications of CELEX. Figure 4 shows the list of CD-ROM versions of CELEX.
JILT Issue 1997 (3) Paper
Nunn-Price NCELEX: Improving Access to Community Legislation
Figure 1 : Characteristics of online legislative databases in Europe.
Country / Database Provider / Database Name / comprehensive [1] / fulltext [2] / consolidated / references [3]B / Ministry of Justice
CREDOC / JUSTEL
BLEX / Yes
Yes / Yes
No / No
- / FT
PF
DK / Ministry of Justice / RETSINFORMATION / Yes / Yes / No / PF
D / Juris GmbH / BUNDESRECHT / Yes / Yes / Yes / PF
EL / Intrasoft
Athens Bar Association / NOMOS
THEMIS / Yes
No / Yes
Yes / Yes
Yes / FT
PF
E / Official Journal (BOE) / IBERLEX / Yes / Yes / No / PF
F / Journaux Officiels
Journaux Officiels
Premier Ministre
Lexis/Lamy / JORF
LEGI
LEX
LOIREG / Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes / Yes
Yes
No
Yes / No
Yes
-
No / FT
FT
PF
FT
I / Corte Suprema di Cassazione
Corte Suprema di Cassazione
Gazzetta Ufficiale (IPZS) / LEXS
TITLEX
GURITEL / L
Yes
Yes / Yes
No
Yes / No
-
No / PF
PF
FT
L / Ministere d’Etat / MELE / Yes / No / - / N
NL / SDU Informatiebank
Kluwer
Vermande
ASSER Instituut / Opmaat
ADW
DUTCH LEG
RUN / Yes
Yes
No
IM / Yes
Yes
Yes
No / No
Yes
Yes
- / FT
FT
FT
PF
A / Bundeskanzleramt (RIS)
Bundeskanzleramt (RIS)
Staatsdruckerei
Parliament / BND
BGBI
BGBI
PARLINKOM / Yes
Yes
Yes
L / Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes / Yes
No
No
No / PF
PF
PF
PF
P / Official Journal (Digesto)
JURINFOR
ATAC
DATAJURIS
TBD / PCMLEX
LEXDATA
ECOLEGIS
DATAJURIS
LEJURIS / Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes / Yes
Yes/No
No
Yes/No
No / No
No
No
No
No / PF
FT
PF
PF
FT
FIN / FINLEX
Ministry of Foreign Affairs / FSLV
EURODOC / Yes
IM / Yes
No / Yes
- / PF
PF
S / Rattsbanken
Parliament
Kommerskollegium / SFS
RIXLEX
GENOMFORANDE / Yes
L
IM / Yes
Yes
No / Yes
Yes
- / PF
PF
PF
UK / Stationery Office
Context Ltd
LEXIS/Butterworth / STATUTE LAW DATABASE
SI
STAT, SI / L
R
Yes / Yes
Yes
Yes / Yes/No
No
Yes / FT
FT
FT
N / Lovdata / NORLEX / Yes / Yes / Yes / PF
CH / Bundesverwaltung / BUNDESRECHT / Yes / Yes / Yes / FT
JILT Issue 1997 (3) Paper
Nunn-Price NCELEX: Improving Access to Community Legislation
Figure 2 : Characteristics of offline legislative databases in Europe.
Country / Database Provider / Database Name / comprehensive [4] / fulltext [5] / consolidated / references [6]B / Ministry of Justice
Perform-Doc
Kluwer
Kluwer
Kluwer / JUSTEL
BELGILEX
JUDIT
TWS-CD
FBW-CD / Yes
Yes
Yes
No
No / Yes
Yes
No
Yes
Yes / No
No
-
Yes
Yes / FT
PF
DK / KARNOV / KARNOV / No / Yes / Yes / PF
D / Juris
Boorberg
MBO
NOMOS / BUNDESRECHT
BGBI I + II
BUNDESRECHT
DEUTSCHES BUNDESRECHT / Yes
Yes
No
No / Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes / Yes
No
Yes
Yes / PF
E / Official Journal (BOE)
LEY
Aranzadi / IBERLEX CD
BDD LEGISLACION
LEGISLACION / Yes
No
No / Yes
No
No / No
-
-
F / Lexis/Lamy
Journal Officiel
Juriscope / LEXILASER LEG + REG
LOIS et DECRETS
TRANSPOSIAL / Yes
Yes
IM / Yes
Yes/I
Yes / No
No
No
I / De Agostini / LEGGI D’ITALIA / No / Yes / Yes
NL / Kluwer
SDU Informatiebank / ADW
OFFICIELE PUBLIKATIES / Yes
Yes, IM / Yes
No / Yes
No
A / Osterreichische Staatsdruckerei
Last / BUNDESGESETZBLATT
OSTERREICHISCHES RECHT / Yes
No / Yes/I
Yes / No
Yes
P / Official Journal (Digesto) / LEXDATA PLUS / Yes / Yes / No
FIN / FINLEX
Ey Edita / FINLEX CD
LAW DB / Yes
No / Yes
Yes / Yes
Yes
UK / Context / SI / R / Yes / No
N / Lovdata / NORLEX / Yes / Yes / Yes
JILT Issue 1997 (3) Paper
Nunn-Price NCELEX: Improving Access to Community Legislation
Figure 3 : Online applications of CELEX
Country / Language / Host / CELEX contents(sectors) / additional contents
D / German / JURIS / original / -
EL / Greek / INTRASOFT / original / -
F / French / ORT (CJCE, JOCE) / 3, 6 / -
I / Italian / ITALGIURE/CC (EURIUS, EURLEX, EURVAR) / original / -
A / German / RIS/BKA / original / -
P / Portuguese / MINISTERIO DA JUSTICA / 1, 2, 3, 4, 6, 7 / -
FIN / English / FINLEX/ M. o. Justice / original / -
S / English / SEMA / original / hyperlinks to national law
UK / English / CONTEXT / original / hyperlinks to national law
English / KNIGHT-RIDDER / original / -
English / FT PROFILE
English / REUTERS
N / English / LOVDATA / original / hyperlinks to national law
USA / English / LEXIS/NEXIS
JILT Issue 1997 (3) Paper
Nunn-Price NCELEX: Improving Access to Community Legislation
Figure 4 : CD-ROM applications of CELEX
Language / Producer / Name / CELEX contents / additional contents / updates per year / price per year (excl VAT)Danish / Context Ltd / CELEX/Justis / original / - / 4 / GBP 1,200
Dutch / Kluwer Datalex/EPMS
SDU Informatiebank / ELEX
CD-ROM EUROPA / not sec. 9
not sec. 9 / literature etc
literature on case law etc. / 4
4 / HFL 4,050
HFL 2,240
English / Context Ltd
ILI - Infonorme London Information
Technical Indexes Ltd / CELEX/Justis
EUROLAW
EUROPEAN LAW / original
original
original / fulltexts, UK impl. Measures, tables
fulltexts, tables
UK impl. measures etc / 4
4
12
6 / GBP 1,250
GBP 1,095
GBP 1,395
GBP 1,295
Finnish / -
French / Context Ltd
ILI - Infonorme London Information / CELEX/Justis
EUROLAW / original
original / fulltexts, tables / 4
4 / GBP 1,200
FF 10,800
German / Context Ltd
ILI - Infonorme London Information
Dr. Otto Schmidt KG / CELEX/Justis
EUROLAW
Eurolex / original
original
original / fulltexts
fulltexts, tables / 4
4
2 / GBP 1,200
ATS 21,290
DEM 2,900
Greek / -
Italian / CEDIS s.r.l
ILI - Infonorme London Information / CELEX Euro-Data
EUROLAW / original
original / fulltexts, tables / 3
4 / LIT 1,3 Mio (DOS)
LIT 1,5 Mio (WIN)
LIT 2,9 Mio
Portuguese / -
Spanish / -
Swedish / -
JILT Issue 1997 (3) Paper
Nunn-Price NCELEX: Improving Access to Community Legislation
3. References to EU law
All the member states, except the United Kingdom, have Official Journals in which new or amended legislation is published. If a piece of legislation is derived from an EU directive then that directive is usually, but not always, referred to in some way in the legislation. If the new legislation is in the form of a regulation then there is always a reference to the original directive. If the directive requires a full Act of Parliament then there is no reference to it in a U.K. Statute and this sometimes occurs in other member states as well (see Figure 5).
It should be noted that since 1990 all Community directives have explicitly stated that there is an obligation on the member states to provide a reference to the directive in their own implementing measures.
4. Notification Procedure
The nationalimplementing measures are monitored not only by the Secretariat General of the Commission but also by Directorate General XV which is responsible for the Internal Market. The Secretariat General has an internal database with which it monitors the implementation process in the member states. Likewise D.G.XV is setting up a database to cover the transposition of directives into national law.
The drafting of national regulations for implementing Community directives is normally done in the responsible Ministry in the respective member states. This draft is then given parliamentary approval and so becomes national law. It is then sent to Brussels, firstly to the respective permanent representative of the member state who then passes it to the Secretariat General of the Commission. Parliamentary approval for a regulation is fairly rapid e.g. one month in the U.K. This process accounts for over 90% of the EU directives. However if a full Act of Parliament is required then this process is much longer and is subject to the vagaries of the parliamentary time table and the national political situation. Compliance of the national law with the original directive is checked by the legal advisers in each member state and their permanent representatives in Brussels and then by the Secretariat General of the Commission. The final arbiter in any dispute is the European Court of Justice.
The references to these national implementations are sent to the CELEX Group and entered into Sector 7 of CELEX. This occurs at the end of a lengthy and tortuous process so it is not surprising that there are errors in Sector 7. The responsibility for the accuracy of entries in Sector 7 must rest with the Secretariat General of the Commission which must improve its checking procedures.
Figure 5 : References to EC directives in the Official Publications
The following table gives a survey of the place and format of the reference of the EC directives in the national implementation measures in the implementing statutes or regulations in the Official publications and the existence of general rules for this referencing.
Country / Place of referenceStatutes/Statutory Instruments / Format of the References
EC Directive CELEX No.
No. date OJ EC (NUMDOC) / General Rules
B / uncertain/preamble / Yes / Yes / No / No / No
DK / footnote / Yes / Yes / Yes / No / Yes
D / uncertain (title, footnote) / Yes / Yes / Yes/No / No / No
EL / uncertain / Yes / Yes/No / Yes/No / No / No
E / title/preamble / Yes / Yes / No / No / No
F / uncertain/visa / Yes / Yes / No / No / Yes
IRL / title or preamble / Yes / No / No / No / No
I / title or preamble / Yes / Yes / No / No / No
L / at the end / Yes / No / No / No / Yes
NL / preamble / Yes / No / Yes/No / No / Yes
A / heading / No / No / No / Yes / Yes
P / preamble / Yes / Yes / No / No / No
FIN / preamble / Yes / Yes / Yes / No / No
S / footnote / Yes / Yes / Yes / Yes / Yes
UK / uncertain/explanatory note / Yes / Yes / Yes/No / No / No
NOR / title / Yes / No / No / No / No
CH / uncertain / Yes / Yes / Yes / No / Yes
In any year member states enact about 3,000 legal instruments each year to implement Community directives. These amount to about 100Mb of characters, possibly as much as 150Mb in any one year if Acts of Parliament and amendments are included.
5. User needs
There have been several surveys of the use of CELEX in recent years. Both the general survey of 1995 and the related survey of the database INFO92 show that Sector 7 is used extensively for its references to national implementing measures. There are also reservations on the reliability and updateness of Sector 7 and so these surveys emphasise the need to back up Sector 7 with information from other sources.
As part of this study a survey of users was carried out in the U.K. A total of 500 questionnaires were distributed and 111 were returned. These were spread among the following types of organisations:
- Universities and European Documentation Centres44%
- Government and Local Government20%
- Private law firms36%
The relative importance of the various sectors of CELEX is shown in the following table compiled from the returned questionnaires:
- Sector 1/2 the treaties and international agreements560
- Sector 3/4 the legislation941
- Sector 5the proposals832
- Sector 6the case law755
- Sector 7 the implementing measures707
- Sector 9the Parliamentary questions303
Clearly the legislation in Sector 3/4 is the most used but the national implementation references in Sector 7 scored highly thus showing that they are important. This table is shown graphically in Figure 6.
A further question asked how often users require information on implementing measures from their own country and from other countries. The results show that:
- 70% of users access UK implementing measures more than once per month
- 40% of users access other countries implementing measures more than once per month
The average frequency is about once a week but some users record daily usage.
Figure 6 : Sector Importance
Another significant result was that no less than 80% of the respondents said that they used the INTERNET or World Wide Web and a further 8% intend to start soon. This clearly shows the impact of the INTERNET on professional users in the UK. It is very likely that this is true in the other member states of the EU.
The Source d’Europe ,which is a joint venture between the French Government and the Commission, has the task of marketing the activities of the EU in a broad sense. This organisation manages an intermediary information service with CELEX as one of its sources. About 80% of the queries which it puts to CELEX are concerned with Sector 7, mostly for French implementation measures but also for U.K. measures and German measures.
All in all it is clear that information on the implementation of EU measures in ones own country is very important, indeed, as important as the original EU legislation itself. The implementing measures in other countries are less universally important but there are groups of users for whom this information is essential. These latter users include;
- the Institutions of the EU especially units of the Commission
- the national government units monitoring implementations in other member states
- large law firms with international practices
- international companies
- academic lawyers researching in comparative law
- export oriented companies
- Parliamentary draftsmen
- etc.
All these user groups need foreign national implementation measures, usually for one or two particular member states. Normally references are sufficient for a starting point and for knowing which text or texts will be required in dealing with a problem.
6. Possible solutions
There are several possible ways for enhancing the relationships between CELEX and the national law databases in the member states, in particular for improving the availability of the national implementing measures. These possibilities include:
a)an improved notification procedure so that Sector 7 of CELEX contains more up to date, accurate references to the national implementing measures
b)adding further information to Sector 7 of CELEX, such as the full titles of the implementing measures
c)extending the coverage of Sector 7 of CELEX with information from other sources so that Sector 7 could be considered as a database in its own right
d)incorporating the full text of the implementing measures in CELEX in the original languages only or, possibly, with translations, or establishing such a database independent of CELEX
e)establishing specific online or off-line databases on a country basis for all or some member states
f)leaving the national implementing measures in the national law databases but providing a single point access to them.
(a) Improved references in Sector 7 of CELEX
At the moment the data in Sector 7 is not very up to date and contains inaccuracies. This must be remedied by tightening up the notification procedure and laying the responsibility for the entries in Sector 7 clearly on the Secretariat General of the Commission. This is an essential first step.
(b) Adding information to Sector 7 of CELEX
The full titles of many of the implementing measures are contained in Sector 7 but not always consistently. These titles should be added systematically in their original languages. There should be no attempt at translating these titles. The commencement dates of these implementations could also be added.
(c) A wider database of references to the national implementing measures
Sector 7 of CELEX could be developed by the addition of data from other sources such as the data from D.G.XV, from Transposial, from DTI Spearhead and from the national databases. This could be a replacement for Sector 7 or a database in its own right.
(d) A full text database of the implementing measures in all the member states
This would be an ideal solution but, like many ideals, impossible of fulfilment in the practical sense. It would be expensive to set up and difficult to maintain. It would be a mixture of official languages which would bring other problems. Finally it is doubtful whether such a database would have sufficient usage to justify its high costs.
(e) Establishing specific databases on a member state basis
It would be sensible to support the creation, in each member state, of a database of its own national implementing measures. Such a database would need to be set up with a high degree of expert legal advice if it is to be comprehensive and cover the relationships between the implementing measures and the national laws. Such a database would be of great value to the monitoring units of the Commission which should therefore support the creation of such databases.
(f) National implementing measures in the national legal databases - with a single point of access
The best solution is for each member state to incorporate the full text of its national implementing measures in its national legal database and for that database to be linked up with the other national databases and CELEX in a logical manner. This is technically feasible and practical in the short term. It avoids the duplication of data and the creation and maintenance of specialist databases used by few people. It also puts the national implementing measures in the context of national law.