Slovakia / Supreme Administrative Court of the Slovak Republic / 2Svk/25/2023 / ECLI:SK:NSSSR:2024:5021200314.1

Združenie domových samospráv, o. z. v Okresný úrad Žilina
Deciding body type
National Court/Tribunal
Decision date
26/06/2024
ECLI (European case law identifier)
ECLI:SK:NSSSR:2024:5021200314.1
  • Slovakia / Supreme Administrative Court of the Slovak Republic / 2Svk/25/2023 / ECLI:SK:NSSSR:2024:5021200314.1

    Key facts of the case:

    OUZ issued a contested decision of 2 March 2020 containing a tree felling permit for 73 trees  to company G.ZDS lodged an appeal againist the tree felling permit before the second instance administrative authority, which by the decision of 25 May 2020 confirmed the decision of OUZ. ZDS than lodged the action for legality revision of the decisions of administrative authorities before the Administrative Court. ZDS claimed that OUZ erred in its findings of the facts of the case, inadequately reasoned the decision and violated procedural rights of the ZDS and issued an illigal decision.By the decision of 19 July 2023, the Administrative Court dismissed the action of ZDS. ZDS then lodged the cassation complaint before the Supreme Administrative Court of the Slovak Republic. It claimed that the Administrative Court improperly assessed the legality of the OUZ's decision, which failed to balance property rights with public environmental interests. Citing Articles 37 and 41 of the Charter and the Aarhus Convention, the ZDS highlighted violations in access to environmental information, asserting that the administrative authorities' decisions contradict European legal standards. ZDS claimed that the administrative authorities used procedural rules abusively, as they failed to provide documents and created obstacles to public access to environmental information, which led to their failure to adhere to principles of good public administration. The ZDS also requested that preliminary questions be sent to the Court of Justice of the EU for clarification on the compatibility of these proceedings with EU law. The Supreme Administrative Court dismissed the cassation complaint as unfounded by the decision of 26 July 2024.

    Key legal question raised by the Court:

    Does the complainant's right of access to environmental information and the right to a healthy environment and the right to good administration include the obligation of administrative authority to send the file to the complainant upon his request under Article 4 of the Aarhus Convention? 

    Outcome of the case: 

    The purpose of Aarhus Convention is to give the parties access to information under the conditions laid down by national law, but not by requiring the administrative authority to disclose and send the file to the parties to the proceedings on request. The Convention calls on the competent authorities to allow the parties to have access to the file, which means that there would be a breach of the law and a breach of the Convention only if the administrative authority in any way prevented a party from having access to the file, from consulting it, from obtaining a photocopy, etc. However, that was not the case in the present case. The complainant was given the opportunity to make copies (including copies on electronic media) of the file in the context of his active act of consulting the file. Neither did he avail himself of the possibility of commenting on the grounds of the decision, even though the administrative authority demonstrably gave him the opportunity to comment on the grounds of the decision before the decision was issued. 

    As regargs the right to good administration, the Court reminded that law of the EU sets a regulative framework also for administrative authorities. Therefore, they must comply with the European standard of general requirements for the quality of public administration procedures and activities, referred to as Good Governance or Good Administration, which are based on the EU law, case law of the CJEU and certain documents of the Council of Europe.

    In this content, the protection of right to a healthy environment and consequent requirements of qood administrative practice, legality, and correctness of decisions of administrative authorities must be in compliance with the principles of good governance and good administration, as it tends to build trust in the rule of law and confidence in the correctness of decisions taken by administrative authorities. The administrative authority did not violate the complainant´s right of access to environmental information.The Court dismissed the cassation complaint. 

  • Paragraphs referring to EU Charter

    36. The Court of Cassation also found unfounded the objection of the complainant that the administrative authorities had not acted according to the 'principles of good administration'. In this regard, it cannot be overlooked that public administration is a public service and the fundamental rules of procedure set out in Article 3 of the Administrative Code, which are based on the system of sources of law, in particular the Constitution (in particular Article 2 thereof) and laws (including legislation based on European Communities law, resp. international treaties), cannot be disregarded in the light of the Court's finding that the complainant's case is based on the principle of public service. Although these sources are formulated in a more general way, given that Slovak law is part of the European legal system, they should be interpreted in the spirit of the European standard of general requirements for the quality of procedures and activities of public administration, collectively referred to as the principles of "good administration" (Good Governance, Good Administration). The principle of good administration is based on the case law of European institutions and certain documents, in particular those of the Council of Europe (in particular the recommendations and resolutions of the Committee of Ministers of the Council of Europe) and the European Union, such as the Council of Europe Recommendation CM/Rec (2007) of the Committee of Ministers of the Council of Europe of 20 April 2007 on good administration.

    37. Although the complainant rightly refers to the premises of good public administration and the consequent requirements of good administrative procedure, legality and correctness of decisions of public authorities in accordance with the principles of good governance and good administration, as well as the fact that the protection of the right to a favourable environment is a public interest, as it is aimed at building faith in the rule of law and confidence in the correctness of decisions of public authorities, it has not shown that the administrative authorities did not act in this way and has not shown that they acted contrary to the principles of good public administration. On the contrary, by responding in detail to all of the applicant's substantive objections, which were essentially directed at the infringement of certain principles of good administration (such as the applicant's alleged infringement of the right of access to the decision documents and the infringement of the right of the public authorities to have access to the decision documents), the administrative court found that the applicant's objections were not in accordance with the principles of good administration and that the administrative authorities had not infringed on the principles of good administration. the violation of the obligation of the administrative authorities (within the meaning of the Administrative Procedure Code, the Aarhus Convention and the Constitution of the Slovak Republic) by not delivering a copy of the file requested by the complainant, as well as the violation of the obligation of the administrative authorities to give proper reasons for their decisions), which were assessed by the administrative court as unfounded, with which the Court of Cassation agreed, it was not possible to assess the complainant's cassation objection as being well-founded. Accordingly, the applicant's objection that the decision of the administrative authority challenged in the administrative action and the judgment of the administrative court are in direct contravention of those principles could not stand, even on the basis of the reasons set out above (see further assessment of the applicant's previous objections). 

  • Paragraphs referring to EU Charter (original language)

    36. Za nedôvodnú vyhodnotil kasačný súd aj námietku sťažovateľa, že nebolo zo strany správnychorgánov postupované v zmysle „princípov dobrej verejnej správy“. V tejto súvislosti nemožno opomenúť skutočnosť, že verejná správa je službou verejnosti a základné pravidlá konania uvedené v § 3 Správneho poriadku, pre ktoré východiskom je systém prameňov práva, predovšetkým ústava (najmä čl. 2) a zákony (vrátane právnej úpravy založenej právom Európskych spoločenstiev resp. upravenej medzinárodnými zmluvami) i keď sú formulované viac všeobecným spôsobom, je potrebné, vzhľadom na to, že slovenské právo je súčasťou európskeho právneho systému, v praxi interpretovať v duchu európskeho štandardu všeobecných požiadaviek na kvalitu postupov a činnosti verejnej správy súhrnne označovaných ako princípy „dobrej správy“ (Good Governance, Good Administration), majúceho základ v judikatúre európskych inštitúcií a niektorých dokumentoch najmä Rady Európy (najmä odporúčania arezolúcie Výboru ministrov Rady Európy) a Európskej únie ako je Odporúčanie CM/Rec (2007) Výboru ministrov členských štátov Rady Európy z 20. júna 2007 o dobrej verejnej správe.

    37. Sťažovateľ síce správne poukazuje na východiská dobrej verejnej správy a z toho plynúce požiadavky dobrého správneho postupu, zákonnosti a správnosti rozhodnutí orgánov verejnej moci v súlade s princípmi Good Governance a Good Administration ako aj na to, že ochrana práva na priaznivé životné prostredie je verejným záujmom, nakoľko smeruje k budovaniu viery v právny štát a dôvery k správnosti rozhodnutia orgánov verejnej moci, nepreukázal však, že správne orgány takto nepostupovali a nepreukázal, že konali v rozpore s princípmi dobrej verejnej správy. Práve naopak tým, že správny súd podrobne reagoval na všetky podstatné námietky sťažovateľa, ktoré smerovali vo svojej podstate k porušeniu niektorých princípov dobrej verejnej správy (ako napríklad sťažovateľom tvrdené porušenie práva na prístup k podkladom rozhodnutia, resp. sťažovateľom namietané porušenie povinnosti správnych orgánov (v zmysle Správneho poriadku, Aarhuského dohovoru a Ústavy SR) nedoručením kópie spisu o ktorú požiadal, ale aj sťažovateľom namietaná porušená povinnosťsprávnych orgánov náležite odôvodniť svoje rozhodnutia), ktoré vyhodnotil správny súd ako nedôvodné, s čím sa kasačný súd stotožnil, nebolo možné takúto kasačnú námietku sťažovateľa vyhodnotiť za dôvodnú. Preto námietku sťažovateľa, že rozhodnutie správneho orgánu napadnuté správnou žalobou ako aj rozsudok správneho súdu sú v priamom rozpore s týmito princípmi, nemohla aj na základe vyššieuvedených dôvodov (pozri bližšie vyhodnotenie predchádzajúcich námietok sťažovateľa) obstáť.