Keywords
Summary

Keywords

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1 . Officials - Decisions adversely affecting them - Duty to state reasons - Purpose

( Staff Regulations of Officials, Art . 25, second paragraph )

2 . Officials - Recruitment - Competitions - Competitions based on qualifications - University diploma or degree required - Meaning of 'diploma or degree' - Determination on the basis of the legislation of the Member State in which the studies took place

3 . Officials - Recruitment - Competitions - Competitions on the basis of qualifications - University diploma or degree required - Requirement not met - Employment as a member of local staff with duties corresponding to an equivalent level of education - Not relevant

4 . Officials - Recruitment - Competitions - Conditions for admission - Requirements stricter than those laid down in the Staff Regulations with regard to grading - Permissible

( Staff Regulations of Officials, Arts 5 and 29; Annex III )

Summary

1 . The requirement that a decision adversely affecting a person should state the reasons on which it is based is intended to enable the Court to review the legality of the decision and to provide the person concerned with details sufficient to allow him to ascertain whether or not the decision is well founded .

2 . In the absence of any provision to the contrary contained in either a regulation or a directive applicable to competitions organized by the Community institutions for the purposes of recruitment or in the Notice of Competition, the requirement of possession of a university degree as a condition for admission to the competition is necessarily to be construed in the light of the definition of such a degree in the legislation of the Member State in which the candidate completed the studies on which he relies .

3 . Assessing whether a particular course of studies or degree is of a university standard is an ad hoc task which each selection board or appointing authority performs, in connection with admission of candidates to a competition or in connection with the engagement of local staff, respectively, taking into account the special features and requirements of each competition or each post to be filled . Consequently, a candidate cannot rely on the fact that he was employed by a Community institution as a member of local staff to do work which might require an equivalent level of education as a ground for the annulment of a decision which refuses to admit him to a competition on the ground that no diploma evidencing completion of studies at the level required by the notice of competition has been produced .

Article 5 seeks to provide a general definition, based on the nature of the duties attached to each post, of the minimum level required for officials of various categories, and does not concern conditions of recruitment . Those are governed by the provisions of Article 29 and Annex III to the Staff Regulations and there is nothing to prevent there being fixed in notices of competition conditions in relation to certain posts or certain categories of posts which are more rigorous than those which correspond to the minimum requirements resulting from the classification of posts, whether such conditions are fixed in order to full a specific vacant post or for the purpose of constituting a reserve with which to fill posts in a certain category .