Selection of cases from the Court of Justice and the General Court for the period from 1 to 3 September

Thursday 2 September 

Judgement in Case C-290/07 P Commission / Scott. This appeal concerns aid allocated by the city of Orleans and the Département du Loiret (France) to Scott Paper in 1987 in view of the construction of a manufacturing plant in the region for the production of paper for household use. This aid consisted in a preferential price for land and application of the water treatment levy – valued at €12.3 million - at a preferential rate which, following an investigation by the Commission in 2000, was decreed incompatible with Community law and was ordered to be reimbursed. Various procedures were brought before the Court of Justice and the General Court at the same time: on 6 October 2006 (Case C-232/05), the Court of Justice criticised France for not having recovered the aid within the set deadline. At the same time, the case was also pending before the General Court, the latter having been requested by Scott to annul the Commission’s decision (Case T-366/00). Likewise, an appeal to annul the same decision was made by the Département du Loiret (Case T-369/00). The General Court issued a first ruling, on 10 April 2003, in which it rejected the arguments of Scott and the Département du Loiret relating to the question of the decree anticipated in Article 15 of Regulation 659/1999. The matter was referred to the Court of Justice, which confirmed, on 6 October 2005, that the case was not decreed (Case C-273/03 P), which allowed the General Court to resume proceedings. In a second judgement of 29 March 2007, the General Court annulled Article 2 of the Commission’s decision of 12 July 2000 ordering the recovery of aid on the grounds that the Commission had not carried out the examination phase of the procedure in a diligent manner and used sufficiently accurate data (Case T-366/00). It is against this second ruling of the General Court in this new case that the Commission made an appeal before the court on the grounds that it committed legal errors with regard to the procedural rights of third parties and the procedural obligations of the Commission in terms of state aid.

Judgement in Case C-399/08 P Commission / Deutsche Post (DE). In June 2002, during the examination of measures taken by Germany in favour of Deutsche Post AG (DPAG), the Commission considered that this company responsible for missions relating to services of general economic interest had obtained significant compensation from state resources. Considering that DPAG had used public financing, initially intended to offset the cost of the universal service, in order to undertake a policy of selling at a loss in the context of its activity of sending parcels by post, an area open to competition, it concluded that this constituted illegal state aid. The Commission therefore ordered Germany to recover state aid totalling €572 million from DPAG. This decision was annulled by the Court of First Instance which, in a ruling of 1 July 2008, contested the method for the verification of costs associated with public service commitments used by the Commission. Via this appeal, the Commission asks the Court of Justice to annul the ruling of the General Court.

Court ruling C-453/08 Karanikolas e.a. On the basis of a complaint by around twenty Greek sardine fishermen who were refused authorisation to practice their activity in the region of Kavala using a certain type of net, Symvoulio tis Epikrateias questions the court on the interpretation of Council Regulation (EC) 1626/94, of 27 June 1994, anticipating certain technical measures for the conservation of fishing resources in the Mediterranean. It asks whether, and under which conditions if necessary, a member state may maintain additional national measures to those contained in Regulation 1626/94, consisting in the absolute prohibition of the use of certain fishing nets, the use of which is, in principle, authorised in accordance with the provisions of this regulation.

Conclusions in joined Cases C-250/09 Georgiev (BG) and C-268/09. This interlocutory question raised by Plovdiski Raïonen Sed (Bulgaria) relates to the issue of the prohibition by Bulgarian legislation of work contracts of an undetermined length for university professors having reached the age of 65 and the compulsory establishment of a definitive retirement age of 68 for these professors. The referring court asks the court whether this legislation is contrary to Council Directive 2000/78/EC, of 27 November 2000, relating to the creation of a general framework in favour of equal treatment in employment and occupation.

Conclusions in Case C-52/09 TeliaSonera. Stockholms tingsrätt (Sweden) asks the court whether the fact that prices applied by a telecommunications operator previously having a monopoly over the wholesale supply of ADSL access to competitors, which are higher than those charged to end consumers, results in a breach of competition.

Also noteworthy

Appeals in Case C-429/09 Fuß (DE). This interlocutory question raised by the Verwaltungsgerich from the city of Halle (Germany) relates to the adjustment of working time and compensatory rights, when an employer (public) has established a maximum weekly work duration for professional firemen which exceeds the limits established by European Parliament and Council Directive 2003/88/EC, of 4 November 2003.