Keywords

Summary



Keywords

1. Procedure – Application initiating proceedings – Conclusions – Alteration once proceedings have been started – Condition

(Rules of Procedure of the General Court, Arts 44(1)(d) and 48(2))

2. Agriculture – EAGGF – Clearance of accounts – Regulation No 1290/2005 – Temporal application – Case notified under Article 3 of Regulation No 595/91 – Scope

(Council Regulations Nos 595/91, Arts 3 and 5(2), and 1290/2005, Arts 32 and 49, third para., second indent)

3. Community law – Interpretation – Acts of the institutions – Declaration recorded in the minutes – Whether to be taken into consideration – Not permissible if no reference to it in the minutes

Summary

1. Under Article 44(1)(d) of the Rules of Procedure of the General Court, the applicant is to state the form of order sought by it in its application. Thus, only the form of order set out in the originating application may be taken into consideration and the substance of the application must be examined solely with reference to the order sought in the originating application.

Article 48(2) of the Rules of Procedure allows new pleas in law to be introduced on condition that they are based on matters of law or of fact which came to light in the course of the procedure. That condition governs a fortiori any amendment to the form of order sought and, in the absence of matters of law or of fact which came to light in the course of the written procedure, only the order sought in the application may be taken into consideration.

(see paras 27-28)

2. The phrase ‘as regards cases notified under Article 3 of Regulation No 595/91’ in the second indent of the third subparagraph of Article 49 of Regulation No 1290/2005 on the financing of the common agricultural policy has a wide scope in so far as it encompasses all the cases which are the subject of a notification under Article 3 of Regulation No 595/91 concerning the irregularities and the recovery of sums unduly paid in the financing of the common agricultural policy. Those cases necessarily include those which are the subject of a first notification under Article 3, then a special notification under Article 5(2).

Prior to the entry into force of Regulation No 1290/2005, the procedure relating to irregularities was in particular defined by Articles 3 and 5 of Regulation No 595/91. Thus, under Article 3, each quarter the Member States were to communicate to the Commission a list of irregularities which had been the subject of primary administrative or judicial findings of fact. Article 5(1) required them subsequently to send to the Commission, each quarter, information relating to the procedures instituted following the irregularities communicated under Article 3, and Article 5(2) provided for the sending of a special notification for the amounts that the Member States considered they were unable to recover. Thus, Article 3 and Article 5(2) of Regulation No 595/91 do not relate to different cases but to different stages, Article 5(2) covering irregularities previously communicated under Article 3 and considered by the Member State to be irrecoverable.

Moreover, according to Article 49 of Regulation No 1290/2005, the articles relating to clearance of accounts (Articles 30 and 31) and to irregularities (Article 32) are applicable from 16 October 2006. It would therefore not be consistent, in the light of the objective of protecting the financial interests of the Community budget pursued by the legislature, to hold that it implicitly intended that special treatment be given to irregularities which had been the subject of a special notification under Article 5(2) of Regulation No 595/91, despite its providing that all the provisions relating to clearance of accounts and irregularities be applicable from 16 October 2006.

(see paras 46-47, 50)

3. A declaration recorded in the minutes of the Council during the adoption of a text cannot be used to interpret a provision of secondary law where no reference is made to the content of the declaration in the wording of the provision in question, and the declaration therefore has no legal significance. The same applies to unilateral declarations of a Member State.

(see para. 65)