ORDER OF THE COURT (Eighth Chamber)
13 February 2025 (*)
( Appeal – Article 181 of the Rules of Procedure of the Court of Justice – Civil service – Staff member of the European Investment Bank (EIB) – Non-conversion of a fixed-term contract into a contract of indefinite duration – Legitimate expectations – Action for annulment and for damages )
In Case C‑614/24 P,
APPEAL under Article 56 of the Statute of the Court of Justice of the European Union, brought on 20 September 2024,
RS, represented by B. Maréchal, avocat,
appellant,
the other party to the proceedings being:
European Investment Bank (EIB),
defendant at first instance,
THE COURT (Eighth Chamber),
composed of S. Rodin, President of the Chamber, N. Piçarra and N. Fenger (Rapporteur), Judges,
Advocate General: J. Kokott,
Registrar: A. Calot Escobar,
having decided, after hearing the Advocate General, to rule by reasoned order, pursuant to Article 181 of the Rules of Procedure of the Court of Justice,
makes the following
Order
1        By his appeal, RS seeks to have set aside the judgment of the General Court of the European Union of 10 July 2024, RS v EIB (T‑624/22, ‘the judgment under appeal’, EU:T:2024:461), by which the General Court dismissed his action for annulment of the decision of the European Investment Bank (EIB) of 20 December 2021 not to convert his employment contract into a contract of indefinite duration (‘the non-conversion decision’), for compensation for the damage he allegedly suffered as a result, and for annulment of the EIB’s letter of 20 December 2021 confirming the non-conversion decision.
The appeal
2        Pursuant to Article 181 of the Rules of Procedure of the Court of Justice, where the appeal is, in whole or in part, manifestly inadmissible or manifestly unfounded, the Court may at any time, acting on a proposal from the Judge-Rapporteur and after hearing the Advocate General, decide by reasoned order to dismiss that appeal in whole or in part.
3        That provision must be applied in the present case.
4        On 6 January 2025, the Advocate General took the following position:
‘Introductory remarks
1.      For the reasons set out below, I propose that the Court dismiss the appeal in the present proceedings as manifestly inadmissible, in accordance with Article 181 of the Rules of Procedure.
2.      In support of his appeal, the appellant puts forward three grounds of appeal, the first alleging infringement of the right to data protection, confidentiality and privacy, the second alleging a “serious” failure to state reasons and the disproportionate character of the non-conversion decision, and the third alleging infringement of the principle of good administration. It should be made clear at the outset that those grounds overlap substantially with those raised in the application at first instance and that the arguments relied on in support of them are, to a very large extent, identical.
The first ground of appeal, alleging infringement of the rights to data protection, confidentiality and privacy
3.      By his first ground of appeal, the appellant complains that the General Court wrongly rejected the first part of his second plea, raised at first instance, alleging infringement of the rights to data protection, confidentiality and privacy.
4.      In support of that first ground of appeal, the appellant claims, in essence, that the General Court failed to have regard to the fact that, during the procedure leading to the non-conversion decision, the EIB had infringed those rights by relying on “void and malicious” accusations made against him in the context of the Dignity at Work procedure that the Directorate-General (DG) of the Personnel Directorate (“Personnel”) wrongly shared with his superiors. That infringes (i) the principle of confidentiality, as enshrined in Article 8.1 of the Dignity at Work Policy, (ii) the right to privacy, which protects the applicant’s personal and leisure interests, and (iii) Article 6 of Regulation (EU) 2018/1725 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 23 October 2018 on the protection of natural persons with regard to the processing of personal data by the Union institutions, bodies, offices and agencies and on the free movement of such data, and repealing Regulation (EC) No 45/2001 and Decision 1247/2002/EC (OJ 2018 L 295, p. 39).
5.      According to settled case-law, an appeal must indicate precisely the contested elements of the judgment which the appellant seeks to have set aside, and also the legal arguments specifically advanced in support of the appeal. That requirement is not satisfied by an appeal that, without even including an argument specifically identifying the error of law allegedly vitiating the contested judgment, confines itself to reproducing verbatim the pleas in law and arguments previously submitted to the General Court, including those based on facts that were expressly rejected by that court. Such an appeal is, in reality, an appeal merely seeking a re-examination of the application submitted before the General Court, which is outside the jurisdiction of the Court of Justice (see, to that effect, judgments of 19 October 2023, Aquino v Parliament, C‑534/22 P, EU:C:2023:802, paragraph 69; of 5 September 2024, SE v Commission, C‑309/23 P, EU:C:2024:693, paragraph 65, and order of 9 December 2021, RY v Commission, C‑193/21 P, EU:C:2021:1051, paragraph 4 (View of Advocate General Medina, point 6, and the case-law cited)).
6.      In support of the first ground of appeal, the appellant merely repeats, to a very large extent verbatim, the line of argument that he had already put forward before the General Court, without specifically calling into question the reasoning on the basis of which the General Court rejected it in the judgment under appeal. Furthermore, the appellant fails to specify the points criticised in that judgment, but concludes, in general terms, that the General Court was wrong to reject his arguments.
7.      Moreover, according to Article 170(1) of the Rules of Procedure, the subject matter of the proceedings before the General Court may not be changed in the appeal. In that regard, it is settled case-law that the jurisdiction of the Court of Justice in an appeal is confined to a review of the assessment by the General Court of the pleas and arguments debated before it. To allow a party to put forward for the first time before the Court of Justice a plea in law which it has not raised before the General Court would be to authorise it to bring before the Court of Justice, whose jurisdiction in appeals is limited, a case of wider ambit than that which came before the General Court (see, to that effect, judgments of 27 April 2023, PL v Commission, C‑537/21 P, EU:C:2023:363, paragraph 31; of 29 February 2024, Euranimi v Commission, C‑95/23 P, EU:C:2024:177, paragraph 53; and of 4 October 2024, Falke v Commission, C‑127/23 P, EU:C:2024:861, paragraph 28).
8.      It is for the first time in the present appeal that the appellant raises the specific ground of appeal alleging infringement of Article 6 of Regulation 2018/1725. In paragraph 107 of the judgment under appeal, the General Court specifically found that the appellant had not explained which provisions of Regulation 2018/1725 had, in his view, been infringed, which was why, in paragraph 108 of that judgment, that court rejected the first part of the first plea in the application at first instance as inadmissible. It follows that this new plea seeks to alter the subject matter of the dispute before the General Court and falls outside the jurisdiction of the Court of Justice in the context of the present appeal.
9.      Consequently, the first ground of appeal must be rejected as manifestly inadmissible in its entirety.
The second ground of appeal, alleging a failure to state “serious” reasons and the disproportionate character of the non-conversion decision
10.      By his second ground of appeal, which relates, in essence, to paragraphs 59, 65, 74 and 75 of the judgment under appeal, the appellant criticises the General Court for having rejected the first part of his first plea, raised at first instance and alleging several irregularities vitiating the non-conversion decision.
11.      In support of that second ground of appeal, the appellant submits, in essence, that both the EIB, in the non-conversion decision, and the General Court did not take account of all the relevant facts and evidence or of the fact that the accusations made against him were dismissed. In paragraph 59 of the judgment under appeal, the General Court wrongly failed to take into consideration, in detail, the statements of the two other female witnesses concerned and the fact that the appellant’s survey “regarding shoes” was mainly conducted outside working hours. In addition, the applicant reiterates that he satisfied all the conditions laid down in Note to Staff No 810 for the conversion of a contract into a contract of indefinite duration.
12.      It is apparent from Article 256(1) TFEU and the first paragraph of Article 58 of the Statute of the Court of Justice of the European Union that an appeal is to be limited to points of law and that the General Court therefore has exclusive jurisdiction to find and appraise the relevant facts and to assess the evidence. The appraisal of those facts and the assessment of that evidence do not, save where the facts or evidence are distorted, constitute a point of law which is subject, as such, to review by the Court of Justice on appeal (judgments of 25 January 2022, Commission v European Food and Others, C‑638/19 P, EU:C:2022:50, paragraph 71, and of 4 October 2024, García Fernández and Others v Commission and SRB, C‑541/22 P, EU:C:2024:820, paragraph 211).
13.      Moreover, a distortion of the facts or evidence must be obvious from the documents on the Court’s file, without there being any need to carry out a new assessment of the facts and the evidence. In the light of the exceptional nature of a ground of appeal alleging distortion of the facts and evidence, an appellant must, pursuant to Article 256 TFEU, the first paragraph of Article 58 of the Statute of the Court of Justice of the European Union and Article 168(1)(d) of the Rules of Procedure, indicate precisely the evidence alleged to have been distorted by the General Court and show the errors of appraisal which, in its view, led to such distortion (see, to that effect, judgments of 18 June 2020, Dovgan v EUIPO, C‑142/19 P, EU:C:2020:487, paragraph 44, of 12 November 2020, Pethke v EUIPO, C‑382/19 P, EU:C:2020:917, paragraph 62, and order of 9 December 2021, RY v Commission, C‑193/21 P, EU:C:2021:1051, paragraph 4 (View of Advocate General Medina, point 6)).
14.      In that regard, it must be stated that, in the context of the second ground of appeal, contrary to the requirements set out in paragraph 5 above, the appellant confines himself, in part, to repeating verbatim the arguments relied on at first instance. Furthermore, in so far as he complains that the General Court wrongly failed to conclude that there were material inaccuracies and manifest errors of assessment committed by the EIB, the appellant asks the Court of Justice to carry out a fresh assessment of the facts and evidence, including the statements of the two female witnesses concerned, as assessed in paragraphs 58 to 79 of the judgment under appeal, without, however, alleging that they were distorted. The appellant does not allege any distortion of the evidence submitted for the Court’s consideration in that context or any material inaccuracy in the findings made by the Court, that are manifestly apparent from the documents in the file.
15.      Accordingly, the second ground of appeal must also be rejected as manifestly inadmissible.
The third ground of appeal: breach of the principle of good administration
16.      By his third ground of appeal, the appellant complains that the General Court rejected the third plea raised at first instance, alleging infringement of the principle of good administration and of his legitimate expectations, as assessed in paragraph 133 et seq. of the judgment under appeal.
17.      In the light of the case-law referred to in paragraph 5 above, it must be held that, in the context of the third ground of appeal, the appellant not only fails to identify the error of law allegedly vitiating the General Court’s reasoning, but also merely reproduces verbatim, to a very large extent, the claims that he made at first instance.
18.      It follows that the third ground of appeal constitutes, in essence, a request for a re-examination of the complaints and arguments submitted for examination by the General Court in the context of the third plea raised at first instance, with the result that it must also be rejected as manifestly inadmissible.
Conclusion
19.      In the light of all of the foregoing considerations, the appeal must be dismissed as being manifestly inadmissible.’
5        For the same reasons as those given by the Advocate General, the appeal must be dismissed as being manifestly inadmissible.
Costs
6        Under Article 137 of the Rules of Procedure, applicable to proceedings on appeal pursuant to Article 184(1) of those rules, a decision as to costs is to be given in the order that closes the proceedings. In this case, since the present order is adopted before the appeal is served on the other parties to the proceedings and, therefore, before they could have incurred costs, it is appropriate to decide that the appellant is to bear his own costs.
On those grounds, the Court (Eighth Chamber) hereby orders:
1.      The appeal is dismissed as manifestly inadmissible.
2.      RS shall bear his own costs.
Luxembourg, 13 February 2025.
A. Calot Escobar
S. Rodin
Registrar
President of the Chamber
*      Language of the case: English.