November infringement package: key decisions

Overview by policy area

In its regular package of infringement decisions, the European Commission pursues legal action against Member States for failing to comply with their obligations under EU law. These decisions, covering various sectors and EU policy areas, aim to ensure the proper application of EU law for the benefit of citizens and businesses.

The key decisions taken by the Commission are presented below and grouped by policy area. The Commission is also closing 73 cases in which the issues with the Member States concerned have been solved without the Commission needing to pursue the procedure further.

For more information on the EU infringement procedure, see the full Q&A. For more detail on the history of a case, you can consult the infringement decisions' register.

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 Letters of formal notice

Working conditions: The Commission calls on GREECE, CYPRUS and MALTA to incorporate the Directive on working time in inland waterways transport into national law

The European Commission decided to open three infringement procedures by sending letters of formal notice to Greece (INFR(2023)2138), Cyprus (INFR(2023)2139) and Malta (INFR(2023)2137) for their failure to incorporate the Directive on working time in inland waterways transport (Directive 2014/112/EU) into national law. These rules implement a social partners agreement that regulates certain aspects of working time for workers employed onboard of vessels in the inland waterway transport sector. In particular, the social partners agreement regulates the duration of daily and weekly working time, rest periods, breaks, maximum working time during night-time, and annual leave. Whether or not a Member State has inland waterways on its territory, the Commission considers that a uniform transposition of the directive by all Member States is necessary to guarantee that the individual employment contracts of mobile workers working on board vessels operated within the Union territory are in full conformity with the provisions of the Directive. Greece, Cyprus and Malta now have two months to notify the Commission of their national measures. In the absence of a satisfactory response, the Commission may decide to send a reasoned opinion.