CEDH · CASELAW;ADVISORYOPINIONS;PROTOCOL16;OPINIONS;ENG — 13 juillet 2022

.s800EAC49 { font-size:12pt } .s339D85E6 { margin-top:0pt; margin-bottom:14pt; text-align:center; page-break-inside:avoid; page-break-after:avoid } .sBB9EE52A { font-family:Arial } .s65E06E64 { margin-top:66pt; margin-bottom:0pt; text-align:center; page-break-inside:avoid; page-break-after:avoid } .s29100277 { font-family:Arial; font-weight:bold } .s34DFC730 { margin-top:0pt; margin-bottom:0pt; text-align:center; page-break-inside:avoid; page-break-after:avoid } .sA36B60A1 { font-family:Arial; font-style:italic } .s598389F8 { margin-top:0pt; margin-bottom:0pt; text-align:center; font-size:11pt } .s4ACA9207 { page-break-before:always; clear:both; mso-break-type:section-break } .s9793A85B { margin-top:0pt; margin-bottom:0pt; text-indent:14.2pt } .s32563E28 { margin-top:0pt; margin-bottom:0pt } .sB9D5CABB { width:28.35pt; display:inline-block } .sA3C2123C { margin-top:0pt; margin-left:28.35pt; margin-bottom:0pt } .s10950C61 { margin-top:0pt; margin-bottom:0pt; text-indent:14.2pt; text-align:justify } .s3AAE10DF { margin-top:14pt; margin-bottom:12pt; text-align:justify; page-break-inside:avoid; page-break-after:avoid; font-size:14pt } .s3CA22BA { font-family:Arial; text-transform:uppercase } .s58699FB5 { margin-top:14pt; margin-bottom:12pt; page-break-inside:avoid; page-break-after:avoid; font-size:14pt } .s9D48DD53 { margin-top:6pt; margin-left:21.25pt; margin-bottom:6pt; text-indent:7.1pt; text-align:justify; font-size:10pt } .s6B505E72 { margin:0pt; padding-left:0pt } .s725FA413 { margin-top:12pt; margin-left:32.01pt; margin-bottom:6pt; text-align:justify; page-break-inside:avoid; page-break-after:avoid; padding-left:1.99pt; font-family:Arial; font-style:italic } .sC7F250FD { font-style:normal } .s7ED160F0 { text-decoration:none } .s66E9FC38 { font-family:Arial; font-size:8pt; vertical-align:super; color:#000000 } .sC93777C { margin-left:17.85pt; margin-bottom:12pt; text-align:justify; page-break-inside:avoid; page-break-after:avoid; font-family:Arial; text-transform:uppercase; list-style-position:inside } .s90404E59 { width:6.48pt; font:7pt 'Times New Roman'; display:inline-block } .sF7610474 { margin-top:14pt; margin-left:36.55pt; margin-bottom:6pt; text-align:justify; page-break-inside:avoid; page-break-after:avoid; font-family:Arial; font-style:italic } .sF1818A31 { margin-top:14pt; margin-left:17.85pt; margin-bottom:12pt; text-align:justify; page-break-inside:avoid; page-break-after:avoid; font-family:Arial; text-transform:uppercase; list-style-position:inside } .sDD290066 { width:3.15pt; font:7pt 'Times New Roman'; display:inline-block } .s4BAE41EE { font-family:Arial; font-size:11pt } .s83BE5C30 { font-family:Arial; font-size:8pt; vertical-align:super } .sA4768B5C { margin-top:14pt; margin-left:28.35pt; margin-bottom:6pt; page-break-inside:avoid; page-break-after:avoid; font-size:10pt } .s6F7FC1B9 { margin-top:14pt; margin-left:17pt; margin-bottom:3pt; text-align:justify } .sE7C30868 { margin-top:12pt; margin-bottom:12pt; text-indent:14.2pt; text-align:justify } .s69DCC830 { margin-top:36pt; margin-bottom:0pt } .sC8AEBC53 { width:10.34pt; display:inline-block } .s743CEC1C { width:180.27pt; display:inline-block } .s5C148630 { width:171.61pt; display:inline-block } .sF6A12959 { width:33%; height:1px; text-align:left } .s85226119 { margin-top:0pt; margin-bottom:0pt; text-align:justify; font-size:10pt } .s653E6C45 { font-family:Arial; font-size:6.67pt; vertical-align:super; color:#0069d6 }   GRAND CHAMBER ADVISORY OPINION on the difference in treatment between landowners’ associations “having a recognised existence on the date of the creation of an approved municipal hunters’ association” and landowners’ associations set up after that date   requested by the French Conseil d’État (Request no. P16-2021-002)           STRASBOURG 13 July 2022   This opinion is final. It may be subject to editorial revision. The European Court of Human Rights, sitting as a Grand Chamber composed of:   Robert Spano, President , Síofra O’Leary, Georges Ravarani, Marko Bošnjak, Gabriele Kucsko-Stadlmayer, Yonko Grozev, Pere Pastor Vilanova, Pauliine Koskelo, Lәtif Hüseynov, Jovan Ilievski, Jolien Schukking, Lado Chanturia, Erik Wennerström, Raffaele Sabato, Saadet Yüksel, Anja Seibert-Fohr, Mattias Guyomar, judges, and Johan Callewaert, Deputy Grand Chamber Registrar , Having deliberated in private on 30 March and 22 June 2022, Delivers the following opinion, which was adopted on the last-mentioned date: PROCEDURE 1.     By a decision of 15 April 2021, sent by a letter of the same date, the French Conseil d’État requested the European Court of Human Rights (“the Court”), under Article 1 of Protocol No.   16 to the Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms (“Protocol No. 16”), to give an advisory opinion on the question set out at paragraph 9 below. 2.     On 31 May 2021 the panel of five judges of the Grand Chamber of the Court, composed in accordance with Article 2 § 3 of Protocol No. 16 and Rule 93 § 1 of the Rules of Court (“the Rules”), decided to accept the request. 3.     The composition of the Grand Chamber was determined on 2 June 2021 in accordance with Rule 24 § 2 (g) and Rule 94 § 1. 4.     By letters of 14 June 2021, the Deputy Grand Chamber Registrar informed the parties (Forestiers Privés de France and the Ministry for Ecological Transition and Solidarity) and the third parties to the domestic proceedings (the Fédération nationale des chasseurs (the National Hunters’ Federation – hereinafter “the FNC”) and the Association nationale des fédérations départementales et interdépartementales des chasseurs à associations communales et intercommunales de chasse agréées – hereinafter “the ANF ‑ ACCA-AICA”) that the President of the Grand Chamber was inviting them to submit to the Court written observations on the request for an advisory opinion by 6 July 2021 (Article 3 of Protocol No.   16 and Rule 94 §§   3 and 4). Within that time-limit, written observations were submitted jointly by the FNC and the ANF-ACCA-AICA. Following acceptance of a request for an extension to the time initially allowed, Forestiers Privés de France submitted written observations on 3 September 2021. After an exchange of these observations between the parties and the third parties to the domestic proceedings, the FNC and the ANF-ACCA-AICA submitted joint observations in reply on 14 October 2021. 5.     On 30 August 2021 the French Government (“the Government”) submitted written observations under Article 3 of Protocol No. 16. The Commissioner for Human Rights of the Council of Europe did not avail herself of that right. 6.     Copies of the observations received were transmitted to the Conseil d’État , which made no comments on them (Rule 94 § 6). 7.     By a letter of 16 August 2021, the Conseil d’État informed the Court that the 6th section of the Judicial Division of the Conseil d’État , on a request by the Poitiers Administrative Court in the case of Association de chasse des propriétaires libres (no. 452327), had transmitted to the Constitutional Council, by a decision of 4 August 2021, a request for a preliminary ruling on constitutionality raising a question similar to that which had given rise to the present request for an advisory opinion. Following receipt of that information, examination of the Conseil d’État ’s request for an advisory opinion was suspended and was subsequently resumed on 4 November 2021, the date on which the Constitutional Council issued its decision on the request for a preliminary ruling on constitutionality submitted to it (see paragraph 24 below). 8.     After the close of the written procedure, the President of the Grand Chamber decided that no oral hearing should be held (Rule 94 § 6). THE QUESTION ASKED 9.     The question put to the Court by the Conseil d’État in Article 2 of the operative provisions of its decision of 15 April 2021 was worded as follows: “What are the relevant criteria for assessing whether a legally established difference in treatment, as described in point 13 of the present decision, pursues, having regard to the prohibitions set out in Article 14 of the Convention taken together with Article   1 of the First Additional Protocol, a public-interest aim based on objective and rational criteria, related to the aims of the law introducing it, which, in the present case, is intended to prevent the unregulated exercise of hunting and promote rational use of game stocks, in particular by encouraging the practice of hunting on grounds with a sufficiently stable and extensive area?” 10.     Point 13 of the decision of 15 April 2021 (to which the question asked by the Conseil d’État refers) is worded as follows: “It follows from Article L. 422-18 of the Environment Code as worded subsequent to the Law of 24 July 2019 that, in addition to landowners or holders of hunting rights over land in a single block of land attaining or greater than the minimum surface area resulting from Article L. 422-13 of this Code, only those landowners’ associations which had a recognised existence prior to the date of creation of the АССА are entitled to withdraw from it, provided that they pool plots of land with a total area meeting the condition laid down in Article L. 422-13; comparable associations created after that date are deprived of that right, even where they bring together plots of land with a total area meeting the condition laid down in Article   L.   422-13.” 11.     Point 16 of the Conseil d’État ’s decision of 15 April 2021 clarifies the “question of principle” which, in its view, arises under Article 14 of the Convention, read in conjunction with Article 1 of Protocol No.   1: “16.     The present dispute thus raises a question as to which criteria should be used in assessing a difference in treatment that is established by law, such as that set out in point   13 ..., in order to assess, in particular, whether the general-interest ground intended to ensure better regulation of hunting can justify reserving the possibility of withdrawal from an approved municipal hunters’ association, as regards owners of land or of hunting rights who attain the minimum threshold by forming an association, only to those associations which existed at the date on which this approved municipal hunters’ association was set up. This question is one of principle, concerning the application of Article 14 of the Convention ... and Article   1 of Protocol No. 1 thereto, which could potentially concern the other States Parties to the Convention, as several other States have on their statutes hunting legislation that is comparable to that in force in France.” THE BACKGROUND AND THE DOMESTIC PROCEEDINGS GIVING RISE TO THE REQUEST FOR AN OPINION 12.     The question put to the Court arises in the context of pending proceedings before the Conseil d’État , to which an application was made following an amendment to Article L. 422-18 of the Environment Code by section   13 (point I, no. 16) of Law no. 2019-773 of 24 July 2019 on the creation of the French Agency for Biodiversity ( l’Office français de la biodiversité ), altering the missions of the hunters’ federations and strengthening the environmental protection police. 13.     The relevant domestic law and practice prior or subsequent to the legislative amendment in issue are set out in paragraphs 25-54 below. The proceedings before the Conseil d’État 14.     By an application of 18 February 2020, the applicant federation, Forestiers privés de France, lodged an appeal for judicial review, for misuse of authority, in respect of Prime Ministerial Decree no. 2019-1432 of 23   December 2019 on the public-service missions of the département hunters’ federations in relation to the approved municipal hunters’ associations (hereinafter “the ACCAs”) and the individual hunting plans, a decree adopted in application of Law no. 2019-773 of 24 July 2019. The FNC and the ANF-ACCA-AICA submitted a joint request to intervene in the proceedings, which was accepted by the Conseil d’État . The Court refers to paragraphs 25 to 28 below for an explanation of the creation, in 1964, of the ACCAs. 15.     Before the Conseil d’État , the applicant federation challenged the inaction of the regulatory authorities, whom it criticised for failing, through the above Decree no. 2019-1432 of 23 December 2019, to amend Article   R.   422-53 of the Environment Code. In its opinion, the temporal distinction introduced by Article L. 422-18 of the Environment Code, as worded following Law no. 2019-773 of 24 July 2019, between landowners’ groups which had been formed prior to or after the creation of the corresponding ACCA was disproportionate and, as such, contrary to Article   14 of the Convention taken together with Article 1 of Protocol No. 1. According to the applicant federation, the aim of preventing destabilisation of the existing ACCAs, put forward by the legislature to justify this difference in treatment, could have been attained by other means, for example by introducing the criterion of a minimum threshold of land for collective withdrawal from an ACCA. It submitted that if hunting had been encouraged in this way on territories with a sufficiently large area, the public-interest aim which had justified the creation of the ACCAs could have been attained without it being necessary to make any kind of temporal distinction between the landowners’ groups as regards the option of withdrawing their hunting grounds from the ACCA. It added that in order to prevent any abuse once the landholding had been withdrawn from the ACCA, the regulatory authorities could have made this right conditional on being able to guarantee the stability of the territory formed by pooling the land belonging to members of such groups. 16.     In support of its allegation that the third paragraph of Article   L.   422 ‑ 18 of the Environment Code as amended was discriminatory, the applicant federation submitted to the Conseil d’État the explanatory memorandum which had been used before the National Assembly to justify the proposed amendment to this provision. The member of parliament who submitted this proposed amendment had argued that the Conseil d’État had departed from its case-law, before concluding that “the legislature must be given its say, in order to prevent the creation of fictive landowners’ associations, a guaranteed precursor to the ACCAs’ ruin and the mismanagement of hunting and wildlife reserves”. The applicant federation also submitted to the Conseil d’État an extract from the official report of a debate in the Senate when enacting draft law no. 2019-773, during which a Secretary of State had accepted that the proposed wording of Article   L.   422 ‑ 18 of the Environment Code could raise legal questions with regard to respect for the peaceful enjoyment of property, before leaving the matter to the Senate’s discretion. 17.     In the defence observations, the Minister for Ecological Transition and Solidarity emphasised that Article R. 422-53 of the Environment Code, challenged by the applicant party, did not result from Decree no.   2019-1432 of 23   December 2019, appealed against before the Conseil d’État , but from Decree no. 66-747 of 6 October 1966, issued in application of Law no. 64 ‑ 696 of 10 July 1964 (known as “the Loi Verdeille”) on the creation of approved municipal and inter-municipality hunters’ associations. In her submission, this latter provision could not be challenged in the context of the appeal for judicial review brought by the applicant federation. 18.     She submitted that, in any event, the provisions of Article R. 422 ‑ 53 of the Environment Code were not incompatible with the new provisions of Law no. 2019-773 of 24 July 2019, since they merely laid down the conditions regulating the right to object, namely that the acquired plots of land had to form, with the original landholdings, a contiguous area in a single block and attain the minimum area laid down in the law. The State was not therefore obliged to amend those provisions to bring them into line with the provisions of Article L. 422-18, third paragraph, of the Environment Code, as amended by the Law of 24 July 2019. 19.     The third-party interveners (see paragraph 4 above) submitted, firstly, that the argument alleging a breach of Article 14 of the Convention taken together with Article 1 of Protocol No. 1 to the Convention was, in their view, unfounded. They argued that the distinction introduced by the legislature in 2019 corresponded to the legitimate aim of avoiding the fragmentation of hunting grounds already grouped together in ACCAs, by preventing the ad   hoc creation of landowners’ associations whose sole purpose would be to break up the territory of the existing АСCАs. They submitted that although Article R. 422-53 of the Environment Code could have been regarded as unlawful on the date in 2018 when, noting that the law was silent, the Conseil d’État had interpreted Article L. 422-18 of the Environment Code, once that provision had been amended by Law no.   2019 ‑ 773 of 24 July 2019 it was no longer necessary to amend it: following the Conseil d’État ’s interpretation, there now existed a legal basis for the fact that it was impossible for associations which were formed after the corresponding ACCA to withdraw from it. 20.     The third-party interveners submitted, secondly, that the fact of authorising the withdrawal of their hunting grounds by small landowners who had formed an association after the creation of the АССА would be tantamount to instituting a legal mechanism favouring the fragmentation of the ACCAs’ territories, which would necessarily jeopardise them. In their view, this would also undermine the aim pursued by the ACCAs, namely preserving the “popular” hunting practised through that arrangement by the pooling of hunting grounds, which thus became accessible to everyone (landowners and non-landowners). The subsequent withdrawal of hunting grounds from the ACCA by small landowners who had formed an association would amount to favouring these landowners, by allowing them to group together in private hunting associations in order to hunt on their own land, although the communal hunting grounds were accessible to all (including hunters who were not landowners). According to the third-party interveners, on the pretext of combating discrimination, the withdrawal of plots of land by landowners’ associations formed after the creation of an АССА would therefore promote discrimination on the basis of “property” between landowning and non-landowning hunters. 21.     By a decision of 15 April 2021, the Conseil d’État , sitting in its judicial capacity, deferred its decision on the applicant federation’s request until the Court had given its opinion on the question asked (see paragraph 9 above). The proceedings before the Constitutional Council (request for a preliminary ruling on constitutionality) 22.     By a decision of 4 August 2021, handed down in a different case ( Association de chasse des propriétaires libres , no. 452327) from that which had resulted in its decision of 15 April 2021, the Conseil d’État referred to the Constitutional Council a request for a preliminary ruling on constitutionality. This ruling concerned the conformity with the rights and freedoms guaranteed by the Constitution of the last paragraph of Article   L.   422-18 of the Environment Code, as amended by Law no.   2019 ‑ 773 of 24   July 2019 creating the French Agency for Biodiversity, altering the missions of the hunters’ federations and strengthening the environmental protection police. 23.     The applicant association in the case of Association de chasse des propriétaires libres alleged that these provisions denied landowners’ associations which held pooled land reaching the required minimum area the right to withdraw from the territory of the ACCA to which they were affiliated if they had been formed after the creation of that ACCA. However, this right had been granted to landowners and landowners’ associations formed before the creation of the ACCA, if their land attained this same surface area. This resulted in a difference in treatment, which it considered contrary to the principle of equality before the law. The applicant association further maintained that, by depriving those landowners’ associations of their right to withdraw, the provisions in question interfered disproportionately with the right of property. 24.     By decision no. 2021-944 (QPC) of 4 November 2021, the Constitutional Council noted, firstly, that the request for a preliminary ruling on constitutionality referred to it concerned the words “having a recognised existence when the association was set up”, appearing in the last paragraph of Article L. 422-18 of the Environment Code. In its opinion, the difference in treatment criticised by the applicant association was based on a difference in situation and was connected to the purpose of the law. The Constitutional Council also considered that, in depriving certain landowners of the right to withdraw their hunting grounds from the ACCA, the impugned provisions did not interfere disproportionately with their right of property. It decided, in consequence, that the words “having a recognised existence when the association was set up”, contained in the last paragraph of Article   L.   422-18 of the Environment Code, were consistent with the Constitution. In reaching this conclusion, the Constitutional Council stated: “5.     ... The principle of equality does not prevent the law from being applied differently in different situations, or from derogating from equality on general-interest grounds, provided that, in both cases, the resulting difference in treatment is proportionate to the purpose of the law establishing it. 6.     The tasks of the ACCAs, in the municipalities of the départements subject to extensive fragmentation of landholdings in which they have been set up, is to ensure, in the general interest, the proper technical organisation of hunting and to promote the balanced management of game, wild fauna and biotopes by organising the practice of hunting over grounds with a sufficiently stable and large area. ... 8.     The impugned provisions deprive landowners’ associations formed after the creation of an ACCA of the right to withdraw from it, even where the pooled landholdings attain that minimum area. In so doing, these provisions give rise to a difference in treatment between, on the one hand, the latter associations and, on the other, landowners and the landowners’ associations which had a recognised existence prior to the creation of the ACCA. 9.     It follows from the drafting history that, in enacting the impugned provisions, the legislature intended to prevent the fragmentation and reduction of the ACCAs’ hunting grounds, and thus to ensure the stability and viability of those grounds. 10.     However, a landowners’ association which is set up subsequent to the [ACCA], when pooling its members’ land with a view to organising their hunting activities notwithstanding the fact that their hunting rights were transferred to the ACCA at the time of the latter’s creation, cannot be regarded as having any other purpose than to withdraw that land from the latter’s hunting grounds. With regard to the purpose of the impugned provisions, such an association is not therefore placed in the same situation as a landowners’ association existing prior to the ACCA and which was already managing game stocks, or a landowner who, alone, holds a plot of land reaching the minimum required area. 11.     The difference in treatment criticised by the applicant association, which is thus based on a difference in situation, is in keeping with the purpose of the law. 12.     It follows from the above that the complaint alleging a breach of principle of equality before the law must be dismissed. 13.     Secondly, the right to hunt on land is linked to the right to use that land, which is an attribute of the right of property. The legislature is free to impose limitations on the conditions for the exercise of the right of property by private individuals, protected by Article   2 of the Declaration of 1789; these limitations may be linked to constitutional requirements or justified by the general interest, provided that this does not lead to disproportionate harm in relation to the aim pursued. 14.     On the one hand, as stated in paragraph 6, the general-interest aim assigned by the legislature to the ACCAs is to ensure the proper organisation of hunting while preserving a balance between hunting, agriculture and forestry. 15.     On the other hand, landowners who are required to transfer hunting rights over their land to the municipal association are not deprived of their right to hunt, but only of the exclusive exercise of that right on that land. In exchange, these landowners, who obtain automatic membership of the ACCA, are authorised to hunt on the whole of the hunting grounds formed by this ACCA. 16.     Thus, by depriving landowners of the right to withdraw their hunting grounds from the ACCA when they form an association for that purpose, the impugned provisions do not disproportionately infringe the right of property. The complaint that there has been a breach of the right to property must therefore be dismissed. 17.     Consequently, the impugned provisions, which do not breach any other right or freedom guaranteed by the Constitution, must be declared in conformity with the Constitution. ...” RELEVANT DOMESTIC LAW AND PRACTICE The circumstances in which the ACCAs were set up 25.     In French law the right to hunt on a plot of land is attached to the right to use that land, an attribute of the right of property. It follows, as stated in Article L. 422-1 of the Environment Code, resulting from the former Article   L.   222-1 of the Countryside Code, that “[n]o one shall have the right to hunt on land belonging to another without the consent of the owner or any person entitled through or under the owner”. 26.     However, in regions where the fragmentation of land ownership was very marked, especially in the south of France, the practice of so-called “public hunting” (“ la chasse banale ”), carried out on land belonging to others by virtue of assumed authorisation, became widespread. The result was that the population figures for certain animal species fell, there was extensive damage to crops and ecosystems and the number of hunting accidents increased. 27.     In order to rectify these consequences, the legislature decided to organise the pooling of landholdings for the exercise of the right to hunt along the lines of the regulations applicable in Alsace and Moselle, in force since the local law of 7 February 1881. 28.     Thus, Law no. 64-696 of 10 July 1964 on the organisation of approved municipal and inter-municipality hunters’ associations (known as “the Loi Verdeille”, the provisions of which, some in amended form, are now consolidated in Articles L. 422-2 et seq. of the Environment Code, introduced approved municipal hunters’ associations (ACCAs) and approved inter-municipality hunters’ associations (AICAs), the purpose of which is defined by Article L. 422-2 of the Environment Code as follows: “The approved municipal and inter-municipality hunters’ associations are designed to ensure sound technical organisation of hunting. They shall encourage, on their hunting grounds, an increase in game stocks and wildlife while preserving a genuine balance between agriculture, forestry and hunting, provide instruction to their members in hunting-related matters and ensure the control of vermin and compliance with hunting plans, by allocating the appropriate resources for that purpose and, in particular, by issuing temporary hunting permits. Their role is also to ensure that hunters contribute to the conservation of natural habitats and wild flora and fauna. Their activity shall be conducted without interfering with property rights or crops and shall be coordinated by the hunters’ federation in the départements . The approved municipal and inter-municipality hunters’ associations shall cooperate with all the countryside partners.” Under Article L. 425-4 of the Environment Code, “the balance between agriculture, forestry and hunting consists in ensuring compatibility between, on the one hand, the sustainable presence of a rich and varied wild fauna and, on the other, the sustainability and economic profitability of farming and forestry activities ... This balance is ensured by the concerted and sustainable management of wild fauna species and their farmland and forest habitats [and] ... by a combination of the following means: hunting, regulation, prevention of game damage by the introduction of protective and dissuasive measures, and, where applicable, authorised culls”. 29.     As one attribute of the right of property, the right to hunt belongs to the landowner, who can reserve this right, give it to a third party in exchange for rent, or lease it to the holder of an agricultural tenancy at the same time as the land on which it is exercised (“owners of the hunting rights”), or hand it over to an ACCA. 30.     Under the legal regime introduced by the Loi Verdeille, and which is still in force in this regard, the conditions for setting up an ACCA differ depending on the département . This distinction was provided for by the legislature in order to encourage the creation of the ACCAs, by targeting in particular those départements in which there existed a strong historical trend of “public hunting”, that is, hunting that was open to everyone. 31.     The creation of ACCAs is mandatory only in certain départements named on a list drawn up by the Minister with responsibility for hunting, on a proposal by the prefect in the relevant département , supported by the département council and after prior consultation with the Chamber of Agriculture and the Hunters’ Federation in that département (Article L.   422 ‑ 6 of the Environment Code). Twenty-nine of the ninety-three metropolitan départements other than Bas-Rhin, Haut-Rhin and Moselle are concerned. In the remainder of these ninety-three départements , the president of the département hunters’ federation draws up a list of municipalities where an ACCA is to be set up; his or her decision is taken on an application by anyone who can furnish evidence that at least 60% of landowners holding at least 60% of the land in the municipality agree to set up an association for a period of six years (Article L. 422-7 of the Environment Code). 32.     Once the ACCA has been created, the applicable regulations are identical, irrespective of whether or not the département in question is included in the list provided for in the above-mentioned Article L.   422-6. Thus, all ACCAs enjoy a prerogative outside the orbit of the ordinary law, namely that of being granted “exclusive” hunting rights throughout the entire territory under their control. 33.     The ACCAs are subject to the ordinary law on associations (Law of 1   July 1901) and to the specific provisions of the Loi Verdeille and the regulatory instruments implementing it (Articles L. 422-1 et seq. and Articles   R.   422-1 et seq. of the Environment Code). The president of the hunters’ federation of each département grants approval after checking that the requisite formalities have been completed and that the association’s constitution and internal rules conform to the statutory requirements (Articles   L. 422-3 and R. 422-39 of the Environment Code). Any change to the ACCA’s constitution, internal rules or hunting regulations must be submitted for approval to the president of the département hunters’ federation (Articles R. 422-1 and R. 422-2 of the Environment Code). 34.     Pursuant to Article L. 422-10 of the Environment Code, the ACCA “shall be established on lands other than those: 1. within a radius of 150   metres of any dwelling; 2. enclosed by a fence ...; 3. forming an uninterrupted area greater than the minimum area referred to in Article   L.   422-13 and in relation to which the owners of the land or of the hunting rights have filed objections; 4. constituting public property belonging to the State, a département or a municipality or forming part of a public forest, or belonging to the French National Railway Company (SNCF), the SNCF Network or SNCF Voyageurs [the SNCF subsidiary responsible for passenger transport]; 5. in relation to which objections have been filed by individual owners, or unanimously by several co-owners acting jointly, who, being opposed to hunting as a matter of personal conviction, prohibit hunting, including by themselves, on their property, without prejudice to the effects of owner liability, and particularly liability for damage caused by game from their lands [1] ”. 35.     Landowners whose land is compulsorily transferred into the hunting grounds of an ACCA become automatic members of it (Article   L.   422-21 of the Environment Code); they lose their exclusive hunting rights over the land but, as members, have the right to hunt throughout the association’s hunting grounds in accordance with its regulations (Articles   L.   422 ‑ 16 and L. 422-22 of the Environment Code). The other attributes of their right of property are unaffected. The transfer of hunting rights to the ACCA entitles the landowner to compensation, payable by the ACCA, for any loss of profits caused by being deprived of a previous source of income. The ACCA is also obliged to pay compensation to owners of hunting rights who have “made improvements to the land over which they have hunting rights” (Article L. 422-17 of the Environment Code). 36.     Hunters who are not landowners and are domiciled or have been residing for more than four years in the municipality where the ACCA has been created are entitled to hunt there if they hold a valid hunting licence. They are ex officio members of the corresponding ACCA. The ACCAs must also accept a percentage of hunters who have no ties with the municipality in which the ACCA was created: this rule concerns, in particular, hunters who live in “an urban area”, where an ACCA cannot be created, and do not own land in the countryside. They can be issued with temporary membership cards, since one of the ACCAs’ missions is to open up access to hunting for as many people as possible, depending on the hunting capacity of the territories in question. The task of supervising the reception of these external members falls to the prefect and the département hunters’ federation with responsibility for coordinating the ACCAs. The conditions for exercising the right to object to the compulsory transfer of hunting grounds and the related administrative case-law 37.     In establishing the system of compulsory transfer of hunting rights to the ACCAs, the legislature set out various conditions enabling landowners who hunt and landowners who are opposed to hunting on ethical grounds to exercise a right of objection. 38.     Thus, the third and fifth paragraphs of Article L. 422-10 of the Environment Code provide, respectively, that the only persons who can object to the compulsory transfer of hunting ground are, firstly, owners of land or hunting rights disposing of land in a single block that exceeds a minimum threshold set by the law, and, secondly, landowners who assert that they are opposed to hunting as a matter of personal conviction (see paragraph   34 above). 39.     This second option for objecting was added by Law no. 2000-698 of 26   July 2000 on hunting, following this Court’s judgment in Chassagnou and Others (cited above). 40.     Under Article L. 422-13 of the Environment Code, “[i]n order to be admissible, the objection by the owners of land or hunting rights referred to in the third paragraph of Article L. 422-10 must relate to at least twenty hectares of land in a single block”. Orders issued in respect of each département may reduce or increase the minimum areas thus defined. However, such increases may not bring the new figure to more than twice the minimum area laid down. 41.     This legal framework as established by the legislature was clarified by the regulatory authority, which detailed the conditions under which the right to withdraw from an ACCA may be exercised by private landowners whose plot of land does not attain a sufficient size to benefit from the right of objection mentioned in Article L.422-10 of the Environment Code. 42.     Under the terms of Article R. 422-53 of the Environment Code, which essentially reproduces Article 44 of Decree no. 66-747 of 6   October 1966, enacted to implement the Loi Verdeille, “where the owner of a plot of land acquires further pieces of contiguous land forming with the first piece of land a single block larger than the minimum size set in that municipality for entitlement to the right to object, he or she shall be entitled to ask for the property thus formed to be removed from the ACCA’s hunting grounds”. 43.     The lawfulness of the distinction introduced by the regulatory authority between, on the one hand, property owners acquiring new land in order to reach the threshold required to be able to withdraw from the АССА in the given municipality and, on the other, landowners’ associations formed after the creation of the АССА whose pooled landholdings reach the same threshold, has been examined on several occasions by the Conseil d’État . 44.     On the basis of the provisions of section 8(3) of the Law of 10   July 1964, the Conseil d’État , sitting in its judicial capacity, held in a section decision of 7 July 1978 in Ministre de la Qualité de la vie v.   Vauxmoret (no.   99333), that, since the law was silent, but having regard to the aim pursued at the time by the legislature in relation to the need to preserve the ACCAs that were being created, the regulatory authority had been entitled, without breaching the law, not to grant landowners’ associations formed after the creation of the АССА the possibility of withdrawing their pooled hunting grounds from its territory, although they thus reached the threshold laid down in the given municipality to be entitled to object: “[T]he fact that, after the compulsory inclusion of his land in the approved hunters’ association, the individual concerned had, with other landowners, formed the so-called Breuil-Mingot Association with a view to constituting a single territory with a surface area of more than 40 hectares, could not, under the provisions of the Law of 10 July 1964 and those of the Decree of 6 October 1966, create on his behalf a right to withdraw his land from the hunting grounds of the approved association and to dispose of the related hunting rights in favour of the private Association being created. Consequently, as Mr X ... did not fulfil one of the conditions required by Article 44 of the Decree of 6 October 1966 for a landowner to be able to avail himself of a right to withdraw, the President of the Poitiers Inter-municipality Hunters’ Association was obliged to reject this request ...” 45.     In his submissions to the judicial formation of the Conseil d’État in the above-cited Ministre de la Qualité de la vie case, the Government Commissioner referred to the aim of “increasing democratic participation in hunting” pursued by the Loi Verdeille as justification for the means employed by the legislature to achieve it: “The general purpose of the 1964 reform is clear. It is not merely a matter of creating viable hunting territories, that is, with a minimum surface area, something that private associations, provided they are effective, can theoretically achieve just as well as the municipal associations. It is primarily a question of reviving what many members of parliament have described as ‘public’ hunting, that is, hunting open to all, while avoiding the excesses which, particularly in the départements of the south of France, resulted in a very rapid reduction of wild game numbers. From this perspective, organised municipal hunting must be the ordinary rule, given the full protection of the law, and private hunting must remain the exception. It is not our intention to pass value judgment on this reform, but it seems clear to us that the possibility given to landowners who are automatically included in the ACCA to withdraw from it every six years, by reaching a simple agreement with their neighbours – admittedly, on condition that this agreement is registered two years before the deadline – would result in the rapid ruin of the approved associations. The objective of ensuring democratic participation in hunting pursued by the law – admittedly at the price of a serious interference with the right of property – would thus be compromised: it is not even certain that the private hunting grounds reconstituted in this way would genuinely exist. Indeed, one can imagine that in many cases the sole purpose of forming [landowners’ associations] would be to remove small landholdings from the control of the ACCA, on each of which each interested party would then continue to hunt on his own account, as was the case prior to the reform. This risk also existed with regard to objections, especially in view of your Moulin de Segères case-law, but it goes without saying that it is a much more serious matter to reopen this ‘valve’ every six years than to have opened it once, when the [Loi Verdeille] entered into force in each municipality.” ( AJDA review, 20 June 1979, p. 39.) 46.     This first decision by the Conseil d’État was supplemented by another, Lamarque and Others (13 February 1980, no. 09807, p. 77), in which it was found that the regulatory authority had been entitled, without breaching the principle of equality before the law, to grant the right to withdraw from the АССА to landowners who acquired land in order to constitute a hunting territory reaching the required minimum threshold, while denying this right to associations of owners of land or hunting rights which were formed after the creation of the relevant АССА, although they disposed of an overall area exceeding the given threshold. Called upon to rule on the differences in treatment introduced by the decree of 6 October 1966, the content of which was essentially incorporated into Article R. 422-53 of the Environment Code, the Conseil d’État held in the Lamarque case that [while] such provisions: “... have the effect of denying to members of associations holding hunting rights which are set up after the creation of the ACCA the right to withdraw their land from that ACCA’s hunting grounds and grant it only to landowners who acquire new land, they are not in breach of the wording of the Law of 10 July 1964, nor do they create unlawful discrimination between holders of hunting rights and landowners who are in different legal and factual situations.” 47.     By a decision of 7 October 1983 ( Association Les propriétaires réunis du Murier , no. 36664), the Conseil d’État specified that the right to withdraw was also not open to a landowners’ association which had existed on the date on which the ACCA was created but which, on that date, was not entitled to object because it did not meet the minimum area requirement. The development in administrative case-law on withdrawal from an ACCA brought about by the Conseil d’État ’s decision of 5   October 2018 48.     In 2018, further to a request from an association of landowning hunters (Association Saint-Hubert) who had been unable to withdraw their pooled land from the hunting grounds of an ACCA, the Conseil d’État decided to revisit its previous case-law. In a decision of 5 October 2018 (no.   407715), it held that the general-interest ground behind the establishment of the ACCAs could not justify a difference in treatment, which it considered manifestly disproportionate, between, on the one hand, individual owners who were entitled to exercise the right to withdraw their land from the ACCA where they acquired supplementary land enabling them to attain the minimum area threshold, and, on the other, owners of land or hunting rights who reached this minimum threshold by pooling their land with a view to exercising their hunting rights together. After annulling the refusal to revoke the provision, the Conseil d’État asked the Prime Minister to amend Article   R.   422-53 of the Environment Code within nine months, so as to ensure its conformity with Article L. 422-18 of that Code, as worded at the relevant time. The relevant passages of the Conseil d’État ’s decision read as follows: “With regard to withdrawal from an approved municipal hunters’ association: ... 5.     ... The principle of equality does not prevent the regulatory authority from laying down different rules for different situations or from derogating from equality for general-interest reasons, provided that, in both cases, the resulting difference in treatment is not manifestly disproportionate having regard to the grounds capable of justifying it. 6.     Under the terms of Article R. 422-53(1) of the Environment Code: ‘Where an owner of land acquires further pieces of contiguous land forming with the first piece of land a single block larger than the minimum laid down in the [given] municipality to permit the right to object, he or she shall be entitled to request that the property thus formed be removed from the ACCA’s hunting grounds. ...’ It follows from these provisions that while the regulatory authority has defined the conditions under which individual owners may benefit from the right to withdraw their land from the hunting grounds of the ACCA when they acquire additional plots of land enabling them to meet the minimum area requirement, it has not, however, specified the conditions under which the same right of withdrawal can be exercised, as nonetheless permitted by Article   L. 422-18 of the same Code, by landowners who, after the ACCA has been created, band together to create a group of plots with a total surface area greater than the minimum threshold, with a view to exercising their hunting rights in common. In failing to do so, it ruled out the possibility for this latter group to request such withdrawal. 7.     The system of approved hunters’ associations corresponds to a general-interest ground, intended to prevent the unregulated exercise of hunting and promote rational use of game stocks, particularly by encouraging the practice of hunting across sufficiently large hunting grounds. This ground justifies the provisions of Article   R.   422-55 of the Environment Code, which provides for the automatic re-inclusion in the territory of the ACCA of any hunting grounds with regard to which an objection has been filed in application of Article L. 422-10 (3), which, for whatever reason and under whatever conditions, has been divided up. While, in complement to the provisions of this Article, the same general-interest ground may also justify a decision by the regulatory authority to attach certain conditions to the withdrawal from an ACCA of hunting grounds formed by a landowners’ association so as to guarantee the stability of those grounds after it leaves the ACCA, it cannot, however, lead to the introduction of the clearly disproportionate difference in treatment consisting in reserving, as a matter of principle, the right to apply for withdrawal of their land from the territory of an already existing ACCA solely to private individuals who own hunting grounds exceeding the minimum threshold, and in excluding owners who attain that minimum threshold by pooling their land together so as to exercise their hunting rights. Accordingly, the provisions of Article R. 422-53 of the Environment Code infringe, to this extent, the principle of equality.” 49.     In his submissions to the bench of the Conseil d’État examining the case of Association Saint-Hubert , the public rapporteur relied, inter alia , on a comparative-law report concerning the legislation and practice in other European countries: “[T]he countries neighbouring France which have introduced a system similar to that of the ACCAs have made no distinction between individual landowners and landowners grouped together through a hunters’ association or society. This essentially concerns countries governed by German law. Thus, the Federal Hunting Act ( Bundesjagdgesetz – BJagdG) allows for private hunts provided that they have at least 75 hectares available, which may be owned by the same person or by a corporate body. All other hunting grounds are integrated into a common hunting reserve, a relative of our ACCAs. Withdrawal of land is also possible both for a landowner and for a group of landowners, provided that they attain the surface area of 75 hectares, a threshold which may vary according to the Land . Similarly, in Austria, in