The European Law Group (ECLG) is a group of lawyers and law scholars from or connected with consumer organisations in Europe. It was established in March 1977 in London with the purpose of strengthening the links between practitioners and researchers involved into the legal promotion of consumer interests in their respective countries. In principle, the group consists of two members per country : one from the university world and the second from a consumer organisation or a consumer agency.

The Group meets every six months on average and the costs of these meetings are covered by the European Commission. It publishes reports and opinions on specific topics deemed to be both most relevant for consumer protection and common to all EU-countries. The aim is to convince all actors involved in European consumer law and policy-making, such as national and Community authorities, and trade and industry, by argumentation and legal reasoning.

A collection of the opinions and the reports which have been adopted by the group between April 1986 and October 1997 was published in 1997 by the Centre de Droit de la Consommation in Louvain-la-Neuve, Belgium. Issues covered by the opinions and the reports are: consumers in debt, exports of dangerous products from the territory of the European Communities, financial services (means of payment, banking services, life and non-life insurance), revising the EC Treaty and consumer provisions, guarantees for consumer goods and after-sales services, unfair terms in consumer contracts, timesharing, denied boarding, regulation of public utilities, products liabilities and liability for services, commercial communications in the internal market, transborder TV advertising, access of consumers to justice, guarantee fund for the travel industry, data protection, intellectual property rights.

All reports previously adopted by the Group had been published in 1984: ECLG Reports and Opinions (September 1997 - March 1984). ECLG Rapports et avis (September 1977 - Mars 1984), Bruylant, Bruxelles, 1984, 424 p.

Go to:

• List of available reports
• List of ECLG Members
• Information on national developments