Keywords
Summary

Keywords

1. Competition - Administrative proceedings - Investigation of complaints - Order of priority assigned by the Commission - Account taken of Community interest in the investigation of a case - Discretion enjoyed by the Commission - Commission obliged to state reasons for a decision not to investigate a complaint further - Judicial review

(EC Treaty, Art. 190 (now Art. 253 EC); Council Regulation No 17, Art. 3)

2. Competition - Administrative proceedings - Investigation of complaints - Assessment of the Community interest in investigation of a case - Account taken of the cessation of the practices in question - Conditions

(Council Regulation No 17, Art. 3)

3. Competition - Administrative proceedings - Investigation of complaints - Assessment of the Community interest in investigation of a case - Criteria - Commission's discretion as to the extent to which it investigates a complaint

(Council Regulation No 17, Art. 3)

Summary

1. When it decides to assign different priorities to the examination of complaints submitted to it under Article 3 of Regulation No 17, the Commission may not only decide on the order in which they are to be examined but also reject a complaint on the ground that there is insufficient Community interest in further investigation of the case.

However, the discretion which the Commission has for that purpose is not unlimited. Thus, the Commission is under an obligation to state reasons if it declines to continue with the examination of a complaint, and those reasons must be sufficiently precise and detailed to enable the Court effectively to review the Commission's use of its discretion to define priorities.

That review must not lead the Court to substitute its assessment of the Community interest for that of the Commission but focuses on whether or not the contested decision is based on materially incorrect facts, or is vitiated by an error of law, a manifest error of appraisal or misuse of powers.

( see paras 31-32, 34 )

2. In deciding to take no further action on a complaint against those practices on the ground of lack of Community interest, the Commission cannot rely solely on the fact that practices alleged to be contrary to the Treaty have ceased, without having ascertained that anti-competitive effects have ceased and, if appropriate, that the seriousness of the alleged interferences with competition or the persistence of their consequences has not been such as to give the complaint a Community interest.

However, in the absence of specific evidence, supplied by the complainant, of a permanent alteration in the structure of the market, the Commission does not err in law with regard to assessment of the Community interest by not expressly investigating whether any anti-competitive effects of the alleged infringement continue to exist.

( see para. 33, 42 )

3. In a decision rejecting a complaint, the Commission may reasonably argue that it is given authority to implement competition policy, which does not mean that its task is to settle individual disputes.

It is also reasonable for the Commission, when assessing the Community interest in investigating a complaint, to take account of the need to clarify the legal position relating to the conduct alleged in the complaint and to define the rights and obligations under Community competition law of the various economic operators affected by that conduct.

Where the Commission is faced with a situation in which numerous factors give rise to a suspicion of anti-competitive conduct on the part of several large undertakings in the same economic sector, it is entitled to concentrate its efforts on one of the undertakings concerned, whilst at the same time indicating to the economic operators who may have suffered damage as a result of the anti-competitive conduct of the other undertakings concerned that it is open to them to bring an action in the national courts. If it were otherwise, the Commission would be forced to spread its resources across a number of separate wide-ranging investigations, with the attendant risk that none could be brought to a satisfactory conclusion. The benefit to the Community legal order stemming from the exemplary value of a decision with regard to one of the undertakings in breach of the competition rules would then be lost, in particular for the economic operators injured by the conduct of the other companies.

The Commission enjoys a discretion as regards the extent to which it investigates a claim. It must balance the significance of the impact which the alleged infringement may have on the functioning of the common market, the probability of its being able to establish the existence of the infringement and the extent of the investigative measures required.

( see paras 43-44, 46, 55 )