Keywords
Summary

Keywords

1. Procedure — Time-limits for bringing actions — Time-bar — Excusable error — Meaning

2. Actions for failure to act — Natural or legal persons — Actionable omissions — Failure to bring an action for failure to fulfil obligations — Inadmissibility — (Arts 226 EC and 232, third para., EC)

Summary

1. With regard to time-limits for bringing actions, an error is excusable where it results from confusion caused by the actual conduct of the institution concerned and the applicant acted in good faith and exercised all the diligence required of a normally well-informed person.

see para. 35

2. An action brought by a natural or legal person for a declaration that, in breach of the Treaty, the Commission failed to act by not initiating proceedings for failure to fulfil Treaty obligations with regard to a Member State is inadmissible. Natural and legal persons may rely on the third paragraph of Article 232 EC only in order to challenge an institution ' s failure, in breach of the Treaty, to adopt measures other than recommendations or opinions of which they are potential addressees or which are of direct and individual concern to those persons. In the context of an action for failure to fulfil obligations under Article 226 EC, the only measures which the Commission may adopt are measures addressed to Member States. In addition, it is clear from the scheme of Article 226 EC that neither a reasoned opinion, which is merely a preliminary stage after which, if appropriate, an action may be brought before the Court of Justice for a declaration of failure to fulfil obligations, nor reference to the Court of Justice by the actual lodging of such an action can constitute acts of direct concern to natural or legal persons.

see para. 44