Official Journal of the European Union

Appeal brought on 23 September 2021 by Public.Resource.Org, Inc., Right to Know CLG against the judgment of the General Court (Fifth Chamber, Extended Composition) delivered on 14 July 2021 in Case T-185/19, Public.Resource.Org, Inc. and Right to Know CLG v European Commission

(Case C-588/21 P)

(2022/C 11/21)

Language of the case: English

Parties

Appellants: Public.Resource.Org, Inc. and Right to Know CLG (represented by: F. Logue, Solicitor, J. Hackl, Rechtsanwalt, C. Nüßing, Rechtsanwalt)

Other parties to the proceedings: European Commission, Comité européen de normalisation (CEN), Asociación Española de Normalización (UNE), Asociaţia de Standardizare din România (ASRO), Association française de normalisation (AFNOR), Austrian Standards International (ASI), British Standards Institution (BSI), Bureau de normalisation/Bureau voor Normalisatie (NBN), Dansk Standard (DS), Deutsches Institut für Normung eV (DIN), Koninklijk Nederlands Normalisatie Instituut (NEN), Schweizerische Normen- Vereinigung SNV, Standard Norge, Suomen Standardisoimisliitto ry (SFS), Svenska institutet för standarder (SIS), Institut za standardizaciju Srbije (ISS)

Form of order sought

The appellants claim that the Court should:

— set aside the judgment under appeal and grant access to the requested documents (EN 71-4:2013, EN 71-5:2015, EN 71-12:2013, and EN 12472:2005+A1:2009);

— in the alternative, refer the matter back to the General Court and

— order the Commission to pay the costs of the proceedings.

Pleas in law and main arguments

1. Error in assessment of the application of the exception in the first indent of Article 4(2) of Regulation (EC) No 1049/2001 (1). a. In the first part, the General Court committed an error in law in incorrectly assessing copyright protection by: — failing to recognise that the requested harmonised standards cannot be protected by copyright since they are part of the EU law and the rule of law requires free access to the law; — failing to recognise that even if the requested harmonised standards can be protected by copyright, free access to the law must have priority over copyright protection; — wrongly holding that the Commission was not authorised to examine whether the requested harmonised standards were protected by copyright and — wrongly holding that the requested harmonised standards constituted an intellectual creation and hence a copyrightable ‘work’. b. In the second part, the General Court committed an error in law in its assessment of the effect on commercial interests by: — wrongly applying a presumption that the requested harmonized standards would undermine the interest protected by the first indent of Article 4(2) of Regulation (EC) No 1049/2001 and — not assessing the specific effects on commercial interests.

2. Error in law in not recognising an overriding public interest. The General Court committed an error in law in not recognising an overriding public interest by: — wrongly finding that the Applicants did not demonstrate specific reasons to justify their request; — taking account of an irrelevant factor, namely the functioning of the European standardization system; — finding that the decision in James Elliott (Case C-613/14) (2) does not create an obligation of proactive dissemination for harmonized standards and — finding that harmonised standards produce only legal effects with regard to the persons concerned.

(1) Regulation (EC) 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 (OJ 2001, L 145, p. 43).

(2) Judgment of the Court of 27 October 2016 (Case C-613/14, James Elliott Construction, EU:C:2016:821).