Keywords

Summary



Keywords

1. Appeals – Grounds – Ground concerning the General Court’s assessment of the duty of the institutions to exercise due diligence – Point of law

(Art. 225 EC; Statute of the Court of Justice, Art. 58, first para.)

2. State aid – Commission decision finding aid incompatible with the common market – Commission’s discretion

3. State aid – Definition – Application of the private investor test – Commission’s discretion

4. State aid – Administrative procedure – Commission’s duties – Diligent and impartial examination

(Art. 88(2) EC)

5. State aid – Commission decision – Assessment of lawfulness by reference to the information available at the time the decision was adopted

Summary

1. Whether the General Court may conclude, on the basis of the facts before it for assessment, that the Community institutions had, or had not, failed in their duty to act diligently is a question of law subject to review by the Court of Justice on appeal.

(see para. 62)

2. In the area of monitoring State aid, the Commission enjoys a broad discretion the exercise of which involves economic assessments that must be made in a European Union context. However, that does not mean that the European Union judicature must refrain from reviewing the Commission’s interpretation of economic data.

Not only must the European Union judicature, inter alia, establish whether the evidence relied on is factually accurate, reliable and consistent but also whether that evidence contains all the relevant information that must be taken into account in order to assess a complex situation and whether it is capable of substantiating the conclusions drawn from it.

However, when conducting such a review, the European Union judicature must not substitute its own economic assessment for that of the Commission. The review by the European Union judicature of the complex economic assessments made by the Commission is necessarily limited and confined to verifying whether the rules on procedure and on the statement of reasons have been complied with, whether the facts have been accurately stated and whether there has been any manifest error of assessment or misuse of powers.

(see paras 64-66)

3. In order to determine whether the sale of land by the public authorities to a private individual constitutes State aid, the Commission must apply the private investor test, to determine whether the price paid by the presumed recipient of the aid corresponds to the selling price which a private investor, operating in normal competitive conditions, would be likely to have fixed. As a rule, the application of that test requires the Commission to make a complex economic assessment.

In such circumstances, the General Court exceeds its review jurisdiction if it merely holds that the Commission acted in breach of its duty to exercise due diligence but did not demonstrate that the information overlooked could have led to a different assessment of the aid value and if it fails to demonstrate that, in doing so, the Commission committed a manifest error of assessment.

(see paras 68-72)

4. The Commission is required, in the interests of sound administration of the fundamental rules of the EC Treaty relating to State aid, to conduct a diligent and impartial examination of the contested measures, so that it has at its disposal, when adopting the final decision, the most complete and reliable information possible for that purpose.

The Commission was obliged neither to take into consideration documents with which it was not provided during the administrative procedure, but which reached it within the further period exceptionally allowed, or even after that had expired and which, in addition, contained only vague assertions, nor to reopen the investigation procedure.

(see paras 90, 95)

5. The lawfulness of a decision concerning State aid falls to be assessed by the European Union judicature in the light of the information available to the Commission at the time when the decision was adopted.

(see para. 91)