Judgment of the General Court (First Chamber) of 14 December 2018 –

FZ and Others v Commission

(Case T‑540/16)

(Civil service — Officials — Reform of the Staff Regulations — Regulation (EU, Euratom) No 1023/2013 — Types of posts — Transitional rules on grading in the types of posts — Article 30 of Annex XIII to the Staff Regulations — Administrators in transition (AD 13) — Administrators (AD 12) — Promotion under Article 45 of the Staff Regulations only allowed within the career streams corresponding to the type of post occupied — Access to the type of post ‘Head of Unit’ or equivalent’ or ‘Adviser or equivalent’ exclusively in accordance with the procedure under Article 4 and Article 29(1) of the Staff Regulations — Concept of an act adversely affecting an official — Confirmatory act — Lis pendens — Compliance with the requirements of the pre-litigation procedure — Inadmissibility)

1. Actions for annulment — Jurisdiction of the EU judicature — Application for annulment of an individual act adversely affecting an official — Union judicature’s lack of jurisdiction to declare a provision of general application unlawful in the operative part of its judgments (Arts 263 and 277 TFEU; Staff Regulations of Officials, Art. 45 and Annex I, as amended by Regulation No 1023/2013) (see paras 39-42)

2. Judicial proceedings — Objection of lis pendens — Same parties, subject matter and submissions in two actions — Inadmissibility of the second action (see paras 46, 50)

3. Actions brought by officials — Prior administrative complaint — Time limits — Complaint lodged out of time — Decision to classify an official in a type of post introduced by Regulation No 1023/2013, and having come into being by a modification made in the computerised personal file of the person concerned — Complaint against a decision confirming that modification — Inadmissibility (Staff Regulations of Officials, Arts 45, 90(2) and 91(1) and (2), and Annex XIII, Art. 30(2), as amended by Regulation No 1023/2013) (see paras 48, 49, 55)

4. Judicial proceedings — Costs — Costs caused unreasonably or vexatiously — Conduct of an institution making a dispute more likely (Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union, Art. 41; Rules of Procedure of the General Court, Art. 135(2); Staff Regulations of Officials, Art. 25(2)) (see paras 58, 59)

Re:

Application based on Article 270 TFEU and seeking annulment of the Commission’s decisions by which the appointing authority of that institution classified the applicants in the ‘administrator in transition’ or ‘administrator’ types of post, with the consequence that, with effect from 1 January 2014, they were no longer eligible for promotion to the next higher grade.

Operative part

The Court:

1. Dismisses the action as inadmissible, in so far as it is brought by FZ and the eight officials of the European Commission, other than GL, whose names are listed in the annex;

2. Dismisses the action as inadmissible and, in any event, as unfounded in so far as it is brought by GL;

3. Orders the Commission to bear its own costs and to pay half the costs incurred by the officials whose names are listed in the annex;

4. Orders FZ and the other officials whose names are listed in the annex to bear half of their own costs;