Judgment — ECLI:EU:T:2000:259
Date: 2000-11-08
Language of the case: French
Court formation: Second Chamber
Based on: Merger Treaty (1965)
Subject matter: Staff regulations and employment conditions - EC
Concepts: Measures of inquiry and measures of organisation of procedure;Adjustment of remuneration;Weightings;General
Procedure: Staff cases - unfounded

SUMMARY - CASE T-175/97 
Summary 
1. Officials — Remuneration — Weightings — Adjustment intended to ensure 
equivalence of purchasing power — Obligation incumbent on Community legislature 
- Failure to comply with time-limits — Not relevant 
(Staff Regulations, Annex X, Art. 13) 
2. Officials — Remuneration — Weightings — Fixing — Discretion of the institutions 
— Judicial review — Limits 
(Staff Regulations, Annex X, Art. 13) 
3. Officials — Remuneration — Weightings — Regulation — Duty to provide a 
statement of reasons — Scope 
(EC Treaty, Art. 190 (now Art. 253 EC); Staff Regulations, Annexes X and Xl) 
4. Officials — Decision adversely affecting an official - Decision of the appointing 
authority applying a measure of general application to the individual situation of an 
official — Obligation to state reasons — Scope 
(Staff Regulations, Art. 25, second para.) 
5. Procedure — Request for measures of inquiry and measures of organisation of 
procedure — Conditions 
(Rules of Procedure of the Court of First Instance, Arts 64(1), 65, 66 and 67) 
6. Officials - Remuneration — Weightings — Special provisions and derogations 
applicable to officials serving in third countries — Principles - Adjustment of 
weighting with retroactive effect — Whether permissible — Salary slip — 
Provisional — Recovery of amount overpaid - Whether permissible 
(Staff Regulations, Art. 64; Annex X, Art. 13) 
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BAREYT AND OTHERS v COMMISSION 
1. The Community legislature is required to ensure that officials in Brussels and in 
other places of employment in third countries enjoy equivalent purchasing power by 
adjusting the weightings. That obligation is not extinguished solely because it was 
not fulfilled within the period prescribed by the Staff Regulations. Even on the 
assumption the periods prescribed in Article 13 of Annex X of the Staff Regulations 
for the adjustment of the weightings are mandatory and that the Community 
legislature failed to fulfil its obligation to adjust those weightings at the prescribed 
time, such a breach of the applicable rules does not affect the validity of the 
regulations fixing weightings. 
(see para. 48) 
2. As regards the statistical methods used for calculating weightings, the 
Commission and Eurostat have a discretion in selecting methods to assess 
equivalence of purchasing power. In order for the Court of First Instance to declare 
the choice of such a method unlawful, the applicant must establish that that choice 
is manifestly erroneous. 
Moreover, the weightings reflect the difference between the purchasing power of 
Community staff in Brussels and that of staff in another place of employment and 
do not merely follow changes in the cost of living in that other place. Consequently, 
the mere reduction of the weighting, even if it is significant and does not reflect a 
reduction in the cost of living in the place of employment, is not a factor which 
points to the existence of a manifest error in the choice of methods to assess 
equivalence of purchasing power. 
(see paras 64-65) 
See: T-544/93 and T-566/93 Abello and Others v Commission [1995] ECR-SC I-A-271 
and II-815, para. 56 
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SUMMARY — CASE T-175/97 
3. The statement of reasons for a regulation laying down the weightings to be 
applied to officials' salaries may be confined to indicating, on the one hand, the 
general situation which led to its adoption and, on the other, the general objectives 
which it is intended to achieve. It is not required to address the technical aspects of 
the procedure for calculation. 
(see para. 75) 
See: Abello and Others v Commission, cited above, para. 89 
4. In the case of a decision by which the appointing authority applies a measure of 
general application to the individual situation of an official, without having any 
discretion in that regard, the statement of reasons may be confined to a reference 
to the legislative measure and an indication, if necessary in the circumstances of the 
case, of the reasons why the appointing authority considers that the conditions for 
the application of that measure to that official are met. The appointing authority is 
not required by the second paragraph of Article 25 of the Staff Regulations to state 
the reasons why the Community legislature adopted the legislative measure. 
(see para. 77) 
5. According to Article 64(1) of the Rules of Procedure of the Court of First 
Instance, the purpose of measures of organisation of procedure is to ensure that 
cases are prepared for hearing, procedures carried out and disputes resolved under 
the best possible conditions. Measures of inquiry under Articles 65 to 67 of those 
Rules are intended to enable the truth of the factual allegations made by a party in 
support of his pleas to be proved. 
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BAREYT AND OTHERS v COMMISSION 
It is not appropriate to order a measure of organisation of procedure or inquiry 
proposed by an applicant where it is not intended to clarify the claims made or 
prove the truth of his factual allegations but is, rather, an attempt to obtain further 
evidence in support of his action, as the applicant is not making specific complaints 
which can be verified or clarified by a request for information or for specific 
documents. 
(see paras 89-91) 
6. Unlike the provisions of the Staff Regulations on the fixing of weightings for 
officials employed within the Member States, Article 13 of Annex X to the Staff 
Regulations does not provide expressly for retroactive effect where new weightings 
are fixed for officials posted to third countries. However, the principle of equality 
of treatment requires that new weightings should apply retroactively with effect from 
the date on which it is recorded that there is no longer equivalence of purchasing 
power. That principle, of which equivalence of purchasing power is an expression, 
underlies, not only Article 64 of the Staff Regulations on the fixing of weightings 
within the Union, but also Article 13 of Annex X to the Staff Regulations on the 
fixing of weightings for third countries, and, therefore, the objective to be achieved 
by fixing new weightings, in other words, respect for the principle of equal 
treatment, requires that regulations adjusting weightings for third countries should 
have retroactive effect. 
A provision which expressly gives the salary slips of officials of the Communities 
posted to a third country provisional status to make it possible to take account of the 
retroactive adjustment of the weightings and which provides for the recovery, by the 
Communities, of the amount overpaid as a result of that adjustment is not contrary 
to the rules on the withdrawal of administrative measures. The retroactive fixing of 
those weightings is necessary to ensure equivalence of purchasing power and the 
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SUMMARY — CASET-175/97 
salary slips cannot give rise to subjective rights other than those derived from the 
rales on remuneration which the salary slips implement. 
(see paras 97-99, 110) 
See: T-177/96 Costacurta v Commission [1998] ECR-SC I-A-225 and II-705, para. 47 
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