Keywords
Summary

Keywords

1 Officials - Actions - Conditions for admissibility - Issue of public policy - Examination by the Court of its own motion - Objection on the ground of lis pendens

(Staff Regulations, Arts 90 and 91)

2 Officials - Actions - Interest in bringing proceedings - No discretion on the part of the administration - Inadmissibility of plea

(Staff Regulations, Art. 91)

3 Officials - Staff of an EAEC Joint Undertaking - Equal treatment

4 Officials - Actions - Subject-matter - Issue of directions to the administration - Inadmissible

(Staff Regulations, Art. 91)

5 Non-contractual liability - Conditions - Actual and certain damage caused by an unlawful act - Annulment of a Commission decision unlawfully rejecting, as a result of incorrect application of the relevant provisions, a request to be recruited to the temporary staff of the Community - Reality of damage dependent on recognition of right to recruitment - Matter to be examined in the context of the implementation of the judgment annulling the decision - Claim for compensation premature

(EAEC Treaty, Arts 149 and 188, second para.)

Summary

6 The conditions laid down in Articles 90 and 91 of the Staff Regulations for the admissibility of an action are matters of public policy which may be raised by the Court of its own motion. Its review is not confined to objections of inadmissibility raised by the parties. It must therefore of its own motion consider whether an application is inadmissible by reason of lis pendens.

7 An official has no legitimate interest in the annulment of a decision where the administration had no discretion and was obliged to act as it did. In that event, annulment of the contested decision could only give rise to another decision identical in substance to the decision annulled.

8 The general principle of equal treatment prohibits any restriction on the mobility of staff made available to the EAEC Joint Undertaking Joint European Torus (JET) by the national host organization, the UKAEA, in comparison with the other research staff at JET, where there is no objective justification for that restriction either in the nature and characteristics of the Joint Undertaking or in the special situation of the host organization.

Thus, just as candidates for a post at JET are free to approach the national organization of their choice for the purpose of their initial assignment, they must be equally free to change organization during the course of their assignment and, in so far as such freedom is allowed to staff made available to JET by a national organization other than the host organization, it must also be extended to staff made available to JET by the host organization.

9 The Community judicature is not entitled, when exercising judicial review of legality under Article 91 of the Staff Regulations, to issue directions to the Community institutions, it being for the administration concerned to take the steps necessary to implement a judgment given on an application for annulment.

10 In the context of non-contractual liability on the part of the Community, the damage for which compensation is sought must be actual and certain.

Whilst the illegality of a Commission decision refusing, as a result of incorrect application of the relevant provisions, a request to be recruited to the temporary staff of the Community not only justifies annulment of that decision but is also capable of giving rise to liability on the part of the Community, such liability cannot actually be incurred unless it is established that the damage claimed by the applicant is real. For that purpose, it is necessary for the Commission to examine, as one of the steps taken to implement the judgment annulling the decision, whether that request in fact satisfies, in the absence of the grounds on which the decision was annulled by the Court, all the requirements for recruitment laid down in the relevant provisions of the conditions of employment of other servants. Until the outcome of that examination is known, any claim for compensation is premature.