Role of a judge when dealing with files on water
EU water legislation as main claim basis or argument
(B) Criminal practice
One of the most significant types of criminal litigation involving water is that pertaining to unauthorised and/or unlawful discharges of used water and/or substances, especially hazardous substances. Leachates from industrial or agricultural facilities as well as from waste storages of landfills are also a potential issue.
(C) Civil and commercial practice
Civil and commercial courts would appear less likely to be confronted by water law issues, although this may change with time.The unlawful discharge or accidental spill-over of waste-water, liquid waste (such as leachates) or hazardous substances, including those products within the ambit of the Nitrates Directive, on a piece of property or even on public lands can be detrimental to the environment at large, within and outside such site. This could happen if the impacted land and surface waters or groundwater are downstream from the point source of the place where a discharge or spill over occurs. While this would more often than not be a situation for administrative practice, it can be also detrimental to the neighbours or to a tenant or an acquirer of the piece of land in question, not to mention workers employed on that site and consumers or users of water abducted at downstream wells. This obviously can give rise to a number of claims based on the applicable municipal property law, sales law, or civil liability law. In such a situation, the violation of waste law will allow the court to characterise the nuisance, the defectiveness or non-compliance of the piece of real estate that was conveyed, or the fault or negligence of the owner or holder of the land vis-a-vis its neighbours or further local consumers and users.
In the above-mentioned matter where a French administrative court ordered the state to indemnify a water company, the private operator had itself been ordered by a civil court to pay damages to the inhabitants of a Brittany city for having provided them with water, the quality of which was not compliant with EU water quality requirements.