Information Note on the Court’s case-law 49

January 2003

Gorraiz Lizarraga and Others v. Spain (dec.) - 62543/00

Decision 14.1.2003 [Section IV]

Article 6

Civil proceedings

Article 6-1

Fair hearing

Equality of arms

Right of State Counsel to submit observations to the Constitutional Court in proceedings brought against the State by the applicants, who did not have the same right: admissible

Fair hearing

Adoption o f law during dispute involving the State: admissible

Article 8

Article 8-1

Respect for home

Construction of a dam: admissible

There are six applicants – an association ( Coordinadora de Itoiz ) and five individual members of that association.  The third applicant is also the association’s president and legal representative.   The association’s aim is to co-ordinate the efforts of its members to oppose construction of the Itoiz dam and protect a reas affected by the project.  In November 1990, it contested the technical plan for construction of the dam approved by the Ministry of Public Works.  Its application was successful, and the plan was partly set aside by decision of the Audiencia nacional in September 1995.  In January 1996, the association secured provisional enforcement of the judgment, ordering provisional suspension of the work.  The state appealed on a point of law and, in a final judgment given in July 1997, the Supreme Court rejected part of the dam construction project, specifically saving the applicants’ holdings, by reason of their ecological value.  Filling of the dam was finally prohibited.  However, the state argued that changes in the law brought about by an act on natural area s adopted in June 1996 made it legally impossible to execute the Supreme Court’s judgment of July 1997.  It contended that these changes in the law meant that work of general interest could now be carried out on land previously excluded from the flooding z one.  The applicant association rejected this position, arguing that the Act of June 1996 had post-dated the administrative decisions reviewed in the proceedings, and also the judgment and decisions on provisional execution, and could not be therefore be a pplied in this case.  It applied for a preliminary ruling on the constitutional validity of certain provisions in the act.  In December 1997, the Audiencia nacional asked the Constitutional Court to give a ruling on the question raised by the applicant ass ociation, and added a new question of its own.  In July 1998, the Constitutional Court formally agreed to consider the questions raised in the application, and notified them to the state, giving it two weeks to submit its observations.  The state’s legal r epresentative presented its observations in September 1998.  The Attorney General also submitted observations.  In March 2000, the Constitutional Court decided that the contested provisions of the Act of June 1996 were compatible with the Constitution and accordingly rejected the application for a preliminary ruling that they were unconstitutional.

Admissible under Articles 6 § 1 and 8, and Article 1 of Protocol No. 1: The Court has decided to join to the merits the Government’s preliminary objections concerning, firstly, the absence of “victims” and the individual applicants’ failure to exhaust domestic remedies, and, secondly, the inapplicability of Article 6 § 1 to the proceedings brought by the applicant association.

© Council of Europe/European Court of Human Rights This summary by the Registry does not bind the Court.

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