ORDER OF THE GENERAL COURT (Appeal Chamber)

16 December 2010

Case T-48/10 P

Herbert Meister

v

Office for Harmonisation in the Internal Market (Trade Marks and Designs) (OHIM)

(Appeal — Civil service — Officials — Promotion — 2008 promotion procedure — Decision awarding points in the promotion procedure — Mention of points accumulated in previous promotion procedures — Distortion of the facts — Burden of costs — Appeal in part manifestly inadmissible and in part manifestly unfounded)

Appeal: against the order of the European Union Civil Service Tribunal (First Chamber) of 30 November 2009 in Case F-17/09 Meister v OHIM [2009] ECR-SC I-A-1-501 and II-A-2-2721, seeking for that order to be set aside.

Held: The appeal is dismissed. Mr Herbert Meister is ordered to bear his own costs and pay those incurred by the Office for Harmonisation in the Internal Market (Trade Marks and Designs) (OHIM) in the appeal proceedings.

Summary

1. Procedure — Decision taken by way of reasoned order — Dispute — Conditions

(Rules of Procedure of the Civil Service Tribunal, Art. 76)

2. Procedure — Decision taken by way of reasoned order — Proceedings concluded by an order related to other actions held admissible

(Rules of Procedure of the Civil Service Tribunal, Art. 76)

3. Appeals — Pleas in law — Error of law relied on not identified — Inadmissibility

(Art. 257 TFEU; Statute of the Court of Justice, Annex I, Art. 11(1); Rules of Procedure of the General Court, Art. 138(1), first subpara., under (c))

4. Appeals — Pleas in law — Plea directed against the Civil Service Tribunal’s decision on costs — Inadmissible where all other pleas rejected

(Statute of the Court of Justice, Annex I, Art. 11(2))

1. The application of a procedure which allows a decision to be given by way of reasoned order without a hearing does not in itself prejudice the right to a proper and effective judicial process, since the Union judicature may make use of that possibility only where it is clear that it has no jurisdiction over the action, or where the action is manifestly inadmissible or manifestly lacking any foundation in law. Where the Union judicature has wrongly considered that the conditions for the application of that procedure were satisfied, it is then for the party concerned to dispute that assessment.

(see para. 29)

See: C-396/03 P Killinger v Germany and Others [2005] ECR I-4967, para. 9

2. An appellant cannot validly rely on an infringement, by the Civil Service Tribunal, of the prohibition on taking a decision without a hearing simply because the contested proceedings, which were concluded by an order of inadmissibility, had a certain factual and legal connection with previous actions which had been declared admissible by the same chamber and the same judge-rapporteur. Such a connection cannot, in itself, prevent the court of first instance from taking account of the particular circumstances of the case to declare the action in question manifestly inadmissible.

(see para. 31)

3. It follows from Article 257 TFEU, Article 11(1) of Annex I to the Statute of the Court of Justice and Article 138(1), first subparagraph, (c), of the Rules of Procedure of the General Court that 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 which does not include any argument specifically identifying the error of law allegedly vitiating the judgment or order in question.

Statements which are too general and imprecise to be legally assessed must be regarded as manifestly inadmissible.

(see paras 42-43)

See: C-19/95 P San Marco v Commission [1996] ECR I-4435, para. 37; C-51/92 P Hercules Chemicals v Commission [1999] ECR I-4235, para. 113; order of 12 December 2006 in C-129/06 P Autosalone Ispra v Commission, not published in the ECR, paras 31 and 32; C-300/99 P and C-388/99 P Area Cova and Others v Council [2001] ECR I-983, para. 37; order of 29 November 2007 in C-107/07 P Weber v Commission, not published in the ECR, para. 24; T-107/07 P Rossi Ferreras v Commission [2008] ECR-SC I-B-1-5 and II-B-1-31, para. 27

4. Under Article 11(2) of Annex I to the Statute of the Court of Justice, no appeal may lie regarding only the amount of the costs or the party ordered to pay them. Moreover, where all the other pleas put forward in an appeal have been rejected, any plea challenging the decision of the Civil Service Tribunal on costs must be rejected as inadmissible by virtue of that provision.

(see para. 53)

See: C-302/99 P and C-308/99 P Commission and France v TF1 [2001] ECR I-5603, para. 31; C-301/02 P Tralli v ECB [2005] ECR I-4071, para. 88