Ministere Public v Deserbais Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 words

Ministere Public v Deserbais - Essay Example The court’s ruling may lead to different interpretations of the judgment and it may raise more questions about the justice system. To avoid such conflicts after judgments, the courts ensure that they make judgments that can be backed up with factual scripts on the law. Cases that generate conflicts are normally those in which the land’s laws are not quite parallel to the provisions of the international laws. Whenever a nation signs an international treaty, the provisions of the treaty may directly affect the laws in the country. The policies of the treaty may dictate one thing while the land law calls for the direct opposite. It is also possible that the treaty may give provisions that are not allowed by the nation in question. There have been several cases that have fuelled heated debates in Europe over the past several decades. One of the most popular cases relating to such conflicts was the Case 286/86 Ministere Public v Deserbais [1988] ECR 4907. This paper will ana lyse the case between Ministere Public v Deserbais. Case analysis Gerard Deserbais was a director in a dairy products business that was playing in the German and French economies. Deserbais had registered his business under the name â€Å"Edam† in France. Edam was the name of the dairy products that the business man was importing to France from Germany. According to analysis done on the imported cheese from Germany, its fats content was 34.3%. Under the French legislation, the name â€Å"Edam† is restricted to cheese containing a minimum of 40% fats. According to the Stresa convention adopted in 1951, the dairy businessmen should only use specific names of their cheese if the cheese meets the required standards (Ministere Public v. Gerard Deserbais, 1988). Following the detection of Gerard Deserbais’ cunning business activities, the French authority arrested him and he was charged with the offence of using a restricted trade name without meeting the provisions o f the name in question. According to the French legislation, the Cheese was substandard and the business man had been swindling the public of the right to consumption of â€Å"Edam† cheese as provided by the name. The most controversial question was whether Deserbais was well acquainted with the provisions of the law in France or not, but in his defence, he suggested that he was well aware of the meaning of the trade name (Ministere Public v. Gerard Deserbais, 1988). The fact that he was ignorant about the French legislation made things worse for his defence. The court did not sympathise with him. Accusation Gerard Deserbais was accused of using a reserved trade name for his cheese in France. He was accused of criminal business activities on grounds that the name â€Å"Edam† was specifically reserved by the French law for cheese containing more than 40% fat. The French Legislation passed the law in 1951 and the trade name was specifically only used by traders whose pro ducts passed the test of the name’s requirements. Edam cheese was a dairy product that was very popular in Germany and it was 34% made of fats. This information about the content of the cheese was made known to the German public through a clear content list pinned to the cheese containers (Wolf, 1999). The basis of the accusations on Mr. Deserbais were controversial since the French legislation claimed that the use of the name was illegal for the substandard cheese products while in the EEC Treaty, which France was a member state, had an article that allowed the member states to import their products freely. Mr. Deserbais’s defence used Article 234 EEC as the backbone of their case.