§ Mr. SpearingTo ask the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food if he will list in theOfficial Report those articles of treaties of the European Community and consequential regulations and directives that render illegal reintroduction of the arrangements for collection, processing, distribution and sale of liquid fresh milk extract in the United Kingdom in 1972.
§ Mr. Jack[holding answer 17 October 1994]: The European Court has ruled that national legislation designed to promote and encourage the establishment of a uniform producer price for milk, by agreement or by authority, at the national or regional level is, by its nature, outside the bounds of the powers given to member states and runs contrary to the principle established by Council regulation 804/68, in particular article 3, of attaining a target price for the milk sold by Community producers during the milk year on the Community market and on external markets. EC Council regulations 1421/78 and 1422/78, as an exception to this principle, provided a legal framework for the continued authorisation of the milk marketing schemes in certain defined circumstances and subject to a number of conditions. While in theory the reintroduction of a milk marketing scheme would be 780W possible under these regulations, in practice any move in this direction would be likely to be met by a proposal from the Commission to the Council for the revocation of the regulations in question.