ORDER OF THE PRESIDENT OF THE EUROPEAN UNION CIVIL SERVICE TRIBUNAL

20 January 2016

Alain Laurent Brouillard

v

European Commission

‛Civil service — Non-admission to the tests in a competition — Interim proceedings — Application for interim measures — Urgency — Lack of urgency’

Application:

under Articles 278 TFEU and 157 EA, and Article 279 TFEU, applicable to the EAEC Treaty pursuant to Article 106a thereof, in which Mr Brouillard seeks an ‘order requiring the [European Personnel Selection Office (EPSO)] by way of an interim measure to allow him to take part in the next stage of Open Competition EPSO/AD/306/15’ held in order to draw up, for the Court of Justice of the European Union, a reserve list from which to recruit French-language lawyer-linguists in Grade AD 7 (‘the competition at issue’).

Held:

Mr Brouillard’s application for interim measures is rejected. The costs are reserved.

Summary

Interim proceedings — Interim measures — Conditions for granting — Urgency — Serious and irreparable harm — Balancing of all the interests involved — Admission of the applicant to take part in the tests of a competition — No urgency

(Art. 266 TFEU; Rules of Procedure of the Civil Service Tribunal, Art. 115(2))

The purpose of the procedure for interim measures is not to ensure that the damage is made good but to ensure that the judgment on the substance of the case takes full effect. For the purpose of attaining that objective, the measures sought must be urgent in so far as, in order to avoid serious and irreparable harm to the applicant’s interests, they must be made and produce their effects even before a decision is reached in the main action. Moreover, it is for the party seeking interim measures to prove that it cannot await the outcome of the main proceedings without suffering harm of that nature.

Admission to the competition procedure of the applicant, who has not been allowed to take part in the tests of the competition at issue, cannot therefore in principle be regarded as urgent in so far as it would enable him to avoid serious and irreparable harm, since, if at the outcome of the main proceedings the contested decision was annulled, it would in any event be for the selection board and the appointing authority to adopt the measures necessary to comply with the judgment, in accordance with Article 266 TFEU, including, subject to review by the judicature, seeking an equitable solution enabling the applicant’s rights to be restored and the harm he has suffered to be made good in full or, if that is not the case, to supplement it by compensation measures, provided the conditions under which the institution incurred non-contractual liability towards him were met.

Furthermore, the applicant’s assertions regarding the future timetable for recruitment competitions are purely hypothetical, not being based on any specific evidence, and do not establish the urgency of the measure sought, whilst an equitable solution, in compliance with a possible judgment annulling the contested decision, might indeed consist in reopening the competition for the applicant.

(see paras 11, 13-14)

See:

Order of 25 March 1999 in Willeme v Commission, C‑65/99 P(R), EU:C:1999:176, para. 62

Orders of 21 December 1995 in Gimenez v Committee of the Regions, T‑220/95 R, EU:T:1995:218, para. 38; of 10 September 1999 in Elkaïm and Mazuel v Commission, T‑173/99 R, EU:T:1999:168, para. 25; of 15 May 2000 in Martín de Pablos v Commission, T‑101/00 R, EU:T:2000:126, para. 22; of 19 December 2002 in Esch-Leonhardt and Others v ECB, T‑320/02 R, EU:T:2002:327, para. 27; and of 19 July 2004 in Eppe v Parliament, T‑439/03 RII, EU:T:2004:242, para. 32

Order of 2 October 2013 in Colart and Others v Parliament, F‑87/13 R, EU:F:2013:147, para. 27