Keywords
Summary

Keywords

1. Acts of the institutions - Decisions - Definitive decisions - Request for reconsideration based on substantial new facts - Obligation on the institution concerned to undertake such reconsideration - Consequences

2. Fisheries - Common structural policy - Improvement and adaptation of structures - Community financial assistance - Request for reconsideration of a Commission decision on the basis of substantial new facts - Refusal based on Article 37(1) of Regulation No 4028/86 - Mistaken legal basis

(Council Regulation No 4028/86, Art. 37(1))

3. Budget of the European Communities - Principles - Yearly budgeting - Scope

(EC Treaty, Arts 199, 202 and 203 (now Arts 268 EC, 271 EC and 272 EC); Financial Regulation, Art. 6)

Summary

1. If a request for reconsideration by a Community institution of a decision which has become definitive is based on substantial new facts, the institution concerned is required to comply with the request. After reconsidering the decision, the institution must take a new decision, the legality of which may where necessary be challenged before the Community judicature. If, on the other hand, the request for reconsideration is not based on substantial new facts, the institution is not required to comply with it. It follows that an action brought against a decision refusing to reconsider a decision which has become definitive will be declared admissible if it appears that the request was actually based on substantial new facts. On the other hand, if it appears that the request was not based on such facts, an action against the decision refusing to reconsider it will be declared inadmissible.

( see paras 48-49 )

2. A clear distinction must be drawn between a reconsideration for the purposes of Article 37(1) of Regulation No 4028/86, on Community measures to improve and adapt structures in the fisheries and aquaculture sector, and a reconsideration of a decision which has become definitive where substantial new facts are invoked. A reconsideration for the purposes of Article 37(1) occurs where a request for financial assistance is carried forward to the next financial year for lack of funds in the first year of assessment. That does not constitute a reconsideration of a decision which has become definitive but a re-assessment by the institution of the request for financial assistance in question in the context of a new financial year. A reconsideration based on substantial new facts, on the other hand, is governed by the general principles of administrative law, as defined in the case-law of the Court of Justice and the Court of First Instance, and entails a reconsideration of a previous decision which has become final. Since there are two types of reconsideration, each having a different legal basis and each serving its own individual purpose, the Commission cannot take Article 37(1) of Regulation No 4028/86 as the basis for its refusal to grant a request for reconsideration of a decision based on what are alleged to be substantial new facts.

( see paras 54-55 )

3. In accordance with the principle of yearly budgeting, laid down in the EC Treaty (Articles 199, 202 and 203 of the EC Treaty, now Articles 268 EC, 271 EC and 272 EC) and in the Financial Regulation (Article 6), sums recovered in one financial year can no longer be used in the context of a previous financial year which has already been closed. Therefore revenue deriving from the repayment of advances by recipients of Community aid in a given year cannot be used, in the context of a previous financial year, to finance an investment project to which a request for aid related.

( see para. 68 )