Keywords
Summary

Keywords

1 Actions for annulment - Actionable measures - Measures producing binding legal effects - Commission letter confirming a decision refusing to disclose the minutes of a comitology committee - Not an actionable measure

(EC Treaty, Art. 173 (now, after amendment, Art. 230 EC)

2 Acts of the institutions - Statement of reasons - Obligation - Scope - Commission decision refusing to disclose the minutes of a comitology committee

(EC Treaty, Art. 190 (now Art. 253 EC); Commission Decision 94/90)

3 Commission - Right of public access to Commission documents - Decision 94/90 - Limits of the principle of access to documents - Rule on authorship - To be narrowly construed - Minutes of comitology committees - Refusal of access founding on the rule on authorship - Unlawful

(Council Decision 87/373; Commission Decision 94/90)

Summary

1 The acts or decisions in respect of which an action for annulment may be brought are those measures which produce binding legal effects such as to affect the interests of the applicant by bringing about a distinct change in its legal position. That is not the position in the case of a Commission letter which merely confirms a decision refusing to forward the minutes of a comitology committee, since in such circumstances the the only act open to challenge for the purposes of Article 173 of the EC Treaty (now, after amendment, Article 230 EC) would be the decision itself.

2 The obligation to state reasons - laid down in Article 190 of the Treaty (now Article 253 EC) - means that the reasoning of the Community authority which adopted the contested measure must be shown clearly and unequivocally so as to enable the persons concerned to ascertain the reasons for the measure in order to protect their rights and the Community judicature to exercise its power of review.

In that connection, a Commission decision refusing to forward the minutes of a comitology committee is sufficiently reasoned where it refers to the rule on authorship laid down in the code of conduct adopted by Decision 94/90 on public access to Commission documents and confirms that, by virtue of that rule, the request was inadmissible on the ground that the author of the documents sought was a third party.

3 Decision 94/90 on public access to Commission documents provides that, where a document held by an institution has been written by a natural or legal person, a Member State, another Community institution or body or any other national or international body, the application for access must be sent direct to the author. Since that `rule on authorship' constitutes an exception to a general principle, it must be construed strictly, so as not to frustrate the application of the general principle of transparency laid down by Decision 94/90.

For the purposes of the Community legislation on access to documents, comitology committees - set up pursuant to Decision 87/373 laying down the procedures for the exercise of implementing powers conferred on the Commission - come under the Commission itself, which is responsible for ruling on applications for access to documents of those committees, such as the minutes of the Customs Code Committee. Comitology committees, which are presided over by a Commission representative, assist the Commission in performing the tasks conferred on it. Moreover, they do not have their own administration, budget, archives or premises, still less an address of their own. Consequently, a committee such as the Customs Code Committee, which does not belong to any of the categories of third-party authors, cannot be regarded as being `another Community institution or body' within the meaning of Decision 94/90. Furthermore, refusal of access to the minutes of the various `comitology' committees would amount to placing a considerable restriction on the right of access to documents, incompatible with the very objective of the right of access to documents.

Consequently, a Commission decision refusing access to the minutes of the Customs Code Committee by invoking the rule on authorship is contrary to Decision 94/90 and must be annulled.