24.6.2014

Official Journal of the European Union

C 194/36

Action brought on 28 April 2014 — Federcoopesca and Others v Commission

(Case T-312/14)

2014/C 194/47

Language of the case: Italian

Parties

Applicants: Federazione Nazionale delle Cooperative della Pesca (Federcoopesca) (Rome, Italy); Associazione Lega Pesca (Rome); and AGCI AGR IT AL (Rome) (represented by: L. Caroli and S. Ventura, lawyers)

Defendant: European Commission

Form of order sought

The applicants claim that the Court should:

—	annul Commission Decision C(2013) 8635 final of 6 December 2013 introducing an action plan to rectify shortcomings in the Italian fisheries control system (‘the contested decision’) and, specifically, paragraphs 13, 15, 16 and 17 of the action plan appended thereto;

—	order the Commission to pay the costs.

Pleas in law and main arguments

The contested decision is intended to rectify the shortcomings observed in the Italian authorities’ implementation of the rules of the common fisheries policy (‘CFP’).

The applicants rely on four pleas in law.

First plea in law: failure to provide a statement of reasons or failure to provide an adequate statement of reasons.

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It is submitted in this connection that the contested decision was adopted in order to deal with certain irregularities detected in connection with the implementation of certain CFP rules. However, that decision does not provide any indication as to the nature of those irregularities, thus making it impossible to identify the logical process which led to its adoption. Such invalidity is all the more serious since the measures introduced by the contested decision tend to derogate from previous EU legislation.

Second plea in law: infringement of the Treaties and of the rules relating to their implementation.

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It is submitted in this connection that the contested decision is vitiated by an infringement of the Treaties and of Article 102(4) of Regulation No 1224/2009, and by a lack of competence. It is not designed to strengthen the controls system, but introduces new obligations; not only are those obligations not laid down in the primary legislation, they are even contrary to that legislation.

Third plea in law: breach of the principles of non-discrimination, reasonableness and proportionality.

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It is submitted in this connection that the contested decision is in breach of the principle of non-discrimination on grounds of nationality, in so far as it establishes new, weightier obligations for Italian fishermen. Next, the measures set out therein clearly have no reasonable correlation to the objective pursued and are inherently unreasonable and disproportionate, since it is not possible in practice to identify how the obligations imposed on the fishermen help to achieve the objective of the contested decision.

Fourth plea in law: unlawfulness of the serious infringements system and, in particular, infringement of Article 92 of Regulation No 1224/2009 and breach of the principle that penalties should be gradated and proportionate.

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It is submitted in this connection that, contrary to Regulation No 1224/2009, which establishes a gradated penalty system, the contested decision requires the automatic suspension of fishing permits in the event of a serious infringement and the definitive withdrawal of such permits in the event of repeated infringements. The contested decision therefore replaces the provisions of the regulation with a different and much more punitive system of automatic and irrevocable penalties. Furthermore, the penalty system imposed by the action plan appears to be in serious breach of the principle that penalties should be gradated, the principle that such penalties should be proportionate to the seriousness of the infringement and the principle that penalties should be applied to the offender alone, since the person holding the permit is penalised regardless of the identity of the person who has actually committed the offence.