Judgment — ECLI:EU:T:2018:560
Date: 2018-09-19
Language of the case: French
Court formation: Eighth Chamber
Subject matter: Provisions governing the Institutions;Access to documents
Procedure: Action for annulment - unfounded
Origin: France

Action brought on 20 January 2017 — Chambre de commerce et d’industrie métropolitaine Bretagne ouest (port de Brest) v Commission (Case T-39/17) Language of the case: French Parties Applicant: Chambre de commerce et d’industrie métropolitaine Bretagne ouest (port de Brest) (Brest, France) (represented by: J. Vanden Eynde, lawyer) Defendant: European Commission Form of order sought The applicant claims that the Court should: declare the application admissible and well-founded and, consequently: annul the European Commission decision of 22 November 2016 [C (2016) 7755 final] in order to grant the applicant’s initial request, that is to say: ‘First of all, the signatories of the present request wish to receive, in accordance with Regulation No 1049/2001 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 30 May 2001 regarding public access to European Parliament, Council and Commission documents, the complete copy of the questionnaire and the answers to which the Commission refers in its opinion 2016/C 302/03 published in the Official Journal of the European Union on 19 August 2016.’ order the defendant to pay the costs. Pleas in law and main arguments In support of the action, the applicant relies on four pleas in law. 1. First plea in law, alleging an overriding public interest in disclosure of the acquired information. The Commission was thus wrong to consider that the applicant had failed to show such an overriding public interest, although it is demonstrated by the European Treaties, namely Articles 10(3) and 11(2) of the Treaty on European Union (‘TEU’), but also Articles 15(1) and 298(1) and (2) of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union (‘TFEU’), as well as Article 42 of the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union (‘Charter’). 2. Second plea in law, alleging the primacy of the European Treaties and the Charter over Regulation No 1049/2001. The applicant considers that that regulation, which introduces lawful restrictions on the principles of transparency, participation and openness, must be interpreted and applied very restrictively taking account of the chronology of the adoption of the legal texts and of the Charter. Therefore, it considers that the defendant, first, should not have applied the general presumption that there is an undermining of the protection of the objectives of the investigation activities in so far as, in the present case, at issue is a cross-sectional enquiry and, secondly, it should have stated that the Member States had not requested that protection. 3. Third plea in law, alleging infringement of Articles 41(2) and 42 of the Charter, which guarantees access to the documents affecting one of the interested parties. 4. Fourth plea in law, alleging infringement of the European Convention on Human Rights, which requires equality of access to documents in the context of legal proceedings, even if administrative, in order to ensure the rights of the defence of the interested parties, in particular Articles 6 and 13 of the Convention. ____________