The 28th Annual Report on monitoring the Application of EU Law issued by the European Commission shows a decrease in the number of infringement procedures launched by the Commission against Member States for failure to apply EU law. An innovative online platform for exchange of information between the Commission and almost all Member States, has played a major role in this context.

The European Commission published the 28th Annual Report on monitoring the Application of EU Law (2010) which shows that a new working method, EU Pilot, has played a major role in addressing possible infringements. In fact, the number of infringement procedures launched by the Commission against Member States for failure to apply EU law has decreased.

In 2010, for questions raised by citizens and businesses, the Commission and 25 Member States use EU Pilot, an innovative online platform for exchange of information between the Commission and almost all Member States, to find quick solutions to problems related to EU law. At the end of the year, the Commission counted nearly 2100 infringement cases, 28% less than 12 months before.

On the report it also underlined that a late transposition more often and this triggered more infringement procedures last year (855) than in 2009 (531). In November 2010, the Commission has taken 317 decisions regarding a full range of sectors and having, in some cases, financial penalties. Policy areas suffering from late transposition include environment, internal market & services, transport, judicial cooperation and fundamental rights. Due to Member States’ efforts more than half of these 855 cases could be closed by the end of 2010. Together with the carry-over from the previous years’, this resulted in 470 pending cases.