Originally Posted by stifle;36365439The [b
EU261[/b] regulation, as passed, made no reference to delays incurring compensation. Delay compensation in the EU was created out of whole cloth in an outlandish exercise in judicial lawmaking by the ECJ.
EU261, as passed, made lots of references to delay compensation under articles 6, 7, and 8 of the regulation. You can read it here:
https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-cont...X%3A32004R0261
What the ECJ has done is what happens with any judicial system with any ambiguity in a law. They clarify that ambiguity.
What's interesting is the preamble to that regulation, which expressly came in because airlines were routinely overbooking and/or cancelling flights for commercial reasons. So the intention was always for the regulation to act as something of a stick to persuade airlines to behave better:
(3) While Council Regulation (EEC) No 295/91 of 4 February 1991 establishing common rules for a denied boarding compensation system in scheduled air transport(4) created basic protection for passengers, the number of passengers denied boarding against their will remains too high, as does that affected by cancellations without prior warning and that affected by long delays.
(4) The Community should therefore raise the standards of protection set by that Regulation both to strengthen the rights of passengers and to ensure that air carriers operate under harmonised conditions in a liberalised market.]
Whether that's now gone too far the other way is a matter of opinion, but the airlines only have themselves to blame for EU261 ever becoming a thing.