Order — ECLI:EU:T:1997:141
Date: 1997-09-30
Language of the case: Portuguese
Court formation: Second Chamber
Based on: Treaty establishing the European Economic Community (1957)
Subject matter: European Social Fund (ESF)
Concepts: European Social Fund;Limitation periods
Procedure: Action for annulment - inadmissible
Origin: Portugal

Summary of the O r d e r 
1. Social policy — European Social Fund — Financial assistance for vocational training opera­
tions — Reduction of assistance initially granted — Exclusive power of the Commission — 
Transfer of the Community's rights to the Member States provided for in Article 6(2) of 
ReguUtion No 2950/83 — Purpose 
(Council ReguUtion No 2950/83, Art. 6(1) and (2)) 
2. Anions for annulment of measures — Time-limits — Point from which time starts to run — 
Act neither published nor notified to the applicant — Prense knowledge of the content and 
grounds — Obligation, once the existence of the act is known, to ask for the full text thereof 
within a reasonable period 
(EC Treaty, Art. 173, fifth para.) 
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SUMMARY — CASE T-151/95 
1. Although any national authority which 
has competence with regard to the financ­
ing of European Social Fund operations 
may, in a final payment claim submitted 
in accordance with Article 5(4) of Regu­
lation N o 2950/83 on the implementation 
of Decision 83/516 on the tasks of the 
Fund, propose to reduce financial assis­
tance granted by the Fund, it is, however, 
the Commission which takes the decision 
on final payment claims and it is the 
Commission, and the Commission alone, 
which has the power to reduce financial 
assistance in accordance with Article 6(1) 
of that regulation. It follows that it is the 
Commission which assumes, vis-à-vis the 
recipient, the legal responsibility for the 
decision by which its assistance was 
reduced, irrespective of whether that 
reduction was or was not proposed by 
the national authority concerned. 
Furthermore, the transfer of rights 
referred to in Article 6(2) of the regu­
lation does not affect in any way the 
power under Article 6(1) to reduce Euro­
pean Social Fund assistance but only the 
rights of the Community to the refund of 
advances improperly paid, so that the 
transfer of rights necessarily presupposes 
a prior Commission decision reducing the 
assistance. 
2. Where an act is not published or notified, 
the period within which proceedings for 
annulment are to be instituted cannot 
start to run until the third party con­
cerned has precise knowledge of the con­
tent and grounds of the act in question, 
provided however that he asks, within a 
reasonable period from the date at which 
he becomes aware of its existence, for the 
full text of the act in question. 
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