WRITTEN QUESTION E-2077/02

by Philippe Herzog (GUE/NGL) to the Commission

(12 July 2002)

Subject: Commission practices in connection with advisers ad personam

A high-level task force was set up in July 2001 to look at the current situation of advisers at the Commission and their future role. Its report of 14 November 2001 notes several management errors over the past two years. It also asks questions about the Commission's practices as regards ad personam advisers, pointing out that this is an unofficial job designation. It recommends that all the ad personam advisers (many of whom were heads of unit and/or advisers), as well as many of the present advisers, should be made into principal administrators or administrators hors classe.

1. On what specific basis does the Commission justify transferring officials from an official post to a personal post not recognised by the staff regulations?

2. On the basis of the information presented by the task force, it is possible that advisers and advisers ad personam have been, or still are, subject to professional and psychological harassment. Is the Commission not pressurising them into taking early retirement?

3. The task force report says that between half and two-thirds of the advisers perform tasks which are insignificant or ill-defined or needlessly duplicate work already done by the units. What has the Commission done to ensure that these advisers and advisers ad personam are given responsibilities, including management posts, corresponding to their professional skills and experience? Has the Commission not compounded the problem by creating new adviser posts since the report was finalised?

4. Is the Commission prepared to initiate new analyses and consultation to solve the above management problems?

Answer given by Mr Kinnock on behalf of the Commission

(16 October 2002)

On the issue of the high level Task Force, the Commission would like to refer the Honourable Member to its reply to written question E-1531/02 from Mr Goebbels(1).

On the specific questions:

1. The Commission points out that the term adviser ad personam neither refers to the functions, nor to the posts but is a title. This title was created in the framework of the rotation exercise of the External Relations Directorate General.

The possibility of appointing officials as advisers ad personam outside the rotation exercise has been explicitly provided for in two Commission Decisions of 18 and 29 September 1999 concerning the Reorganisation of administrative structures of the Commission. These Decisions create a basis on which each Appointing Authority (AIPN Directors General) has the right and power conferred to them under the AIPN-rules.

As recently judged by the Court of First Instance in a case concerning precisely an adviser ad personam, the principle of equivalence of grade and post; laid down by Article 5 of the Staff Regulations, does not prevent the Appointing Authority from entrusting to an official duties differing from those he has previously performed and regarded by this official as a reduction of his responsibilities (judgement of 16 April 2002 in case T-51/01, Fronia, ground 53).

2. The Commission does not concur with the interpretation of the Task Force Report made by the Honourable Member. In fact, the Commission did not receive any formal complaint from advisers or advisers ad personam about professional or psychological harassment, and the Commission is certainly not forcing them to take early retirement. Once adopted, the relevant regulation will, naturally, be evenly applied to advisers as well as to any other official.

3. The Commission set up the Task Force to evaluate the tasks performed by advisers and advisers ad personam, to analyse problems and to make recommendations. The Task Force has asked each Directorate General to review all existing adviser and adviser ad personam jobs and to identify a solution which would ensure that each official is effectively posted on a function corresponding to his/her qualifications. According to Article 5 of the Staff Regulations, this also includes principal administrator and hors-classe administrator posts.

Advisers may always apply for any management post vacancy, and such vacancies are now managed in a decentralised way by individual Directors General. Directorates General are recommended, wherever possible, to assign/integrate advisers to line-management functions in the context of the restructuring of services.

The very few adviser functions which have been created since the Task Force report are to cater for specific administrative situations. Adviser ad personam posts are suitable only if it is in the interest of the service and clear responsibilities are attached to the post. That approach ensures that post holders are given appropriate tasks.

4. Concerning the follow-up to this report, the Commission would like to refer the Honourable Member to the reply given to the above-mentioned written question (E-1531/02 by Mr Goebbels).

(1) See page 19.