Austrian book price-fixing is against EU laws, says Europe's top court

The European Union's top court ruled in the case brought by bookseller Libro against Austria's price-controlling book and media trade association, Fachverband der Buch- und Medienwirtschaft.

Fachverband has the right to set a minimum price for imported books in German, but Libro advertised books below those prices. Around 80% of its sales are imported books in German.

Fachverband attempted to stop the sales and it was backed by Austrian courts, which said that the price fixing was "justified for cultural reasons and by the need to maintain media diversity".

The ECJ has now said that Fachverband's activities are an unjustified restriction on the free movement of goods.

The ECJ said that countries were allowed to have laws which prohibit certain selling arrangements, but only if they "apply to all relevant traders operating within the national territory and that they affect in the same manner, in law and in fact, the marketing of domestic products and of those from other Member States", said the ECJ's ruling.

The ECJ found that this was not the case, that because Austria's rules applied only to imported books, they were restricting the ability of businesses in other member states to trade freely in Austria.

"[The law] provides for a less favourable treatment for imported books … since it prevents Austrian importers and foreign publishers from fixing minimum retail prices according to the conditions of the import market, whereas the Austrian publishers are free to fix themselves, for their goods, such minimum retail prices for the national market," said the ruling.

"Such provisions are to be regarded as a measure having equivalent effect to an import restriction contrary to [EU governing document The EC Treaty], in so far as they create, for imported books, a distinct regulation which has the effect of treating products from other Member States less favourably," it said.

The Court recognised that the cultural importance of books can be important enough to justify some trade restriction, but this was not true in the Libro case.

"The protection of books as cultural objects can be considered as an overriding requirement in the public interest capable of justifying measures restricting the free movement of goods, on condition that those measures are appropriate for achieving the objective fixed and do not go beyond what is necessary to achieve it," said the ruling.

The Court said that there was no justification for the degree of action taken by Austria in fixing import prices.

"The objective of the protection of books as cultural objects can be achieved by measures less restrictive for the importer, for example by allowing the latter or the foreign publisher to fix a retail price for the Austrian market which takes the conditions of that market into account," it said, saying that the restrictions "cannot be justified".