Keywords
Summary

Keywords

Actions for annulment – Actionable measures – Concept – Measures producing binding legal effects

(Art. 230 EC; European Parliament and Council Regulation No 1049/2001, Arts 4(7), 6(1), 7 and 8(1) and (3))

Summary

By providing for a two-stage procedure and thus aiming to guarantee swift and straightforward access to documents, Regulation No 1049/2001 regarding public access to European Parliament, Council and Commission documents confers a very extensive right of access to the documents of the institutions concerned, there being, in accordance with Article 6(1) of the regulation, no requirement to state reasons for the application in order to enjoy that right. In addition, under Article 4(7) of that regulation, the exceptions as laid down in paragraphs 1 to 3 of that article are to apply only for the period during which protection is justified on the basis of the content of the document. It follows that a person may make a new demand for access relating to documents to which he has previously been denied access. Such an application requires the institution concerned to examine whether the earlier refusal of access remains justified in the light of a change in the legal or factual situation which has taken place in the meantime.

A Commission measure refusing access to documents must therefore be regarded as constituting a definitive refusal where that definitive nature results both from its content, which refers explicitly to a ‘definitive position’ of the Commission, and the context in which it was adopted, that is at the end of a long series of successive steps taken by the applicant over approximately three years, including several applications, and having given rise to a case before the Ombudsman and a detailed opinion by the Commission in that context.

In such circumstances, the Commission cannot reasonably claim that, once it had received notification of the contested measure, the applicant should have made a new application and waited until that institution refused its application again before it could be regarded as a definitive measure and, thus, open to challenge. Such a step by the applicant could not have led to the result desired by it, in the light of the fact that the Commission had examined its application for access in detail and had clearly and definitively adopted its position with regard to the refusal of access to the documents sought.

To require such a step to be taken would moreover have been contrary to the stated objective of guaranteeing swift and straightforward access to the documents of the institutions concerned.

Such a refusal constitutes a measure open to challenge which could be the subject of an action for annulment under Article 230 EC. The action is therefore admissible.

(see paras 56-62)