Case C-280/19P: Appeal brought on 2 April 2019 by the European Research Council Executive Agency (ERCEA) against the judgment of the General Court (Eighth Chamber) delivered on 17 January 2019 in Case T-348/16 OP Aristot leio Panepistimio Thessalonikis v ERCEA
Date: 2019-04-02
Institutions: Court of Justice
Subjects: EU aid, Framework Programme for Research and Development, expenditure, reimbursement of aid, research project, research staff, teleworking, wage cost








C_2019182EN.01002801.xml










27.5.2019   


EN


Official Journal of the European Union


C 182/28






Appeal brought on 2 April 2019 by the European Research Council Executive Agency (ERCEA) against the judgment of the General Court (Eighth Chamber) delivered on 17 January 2019 in Case T-348/16 OP Aristot leio Panepistimio Thessalonikis v ERCEA
(Case C-280/19P)
(2019/C 182/34)
Language of the case: Greek

Parties


Appellant: European Research Council Executive Agency (ERCEA) (represented by: Francesca Sgritta and Miguel Pesquera Alonso, acting as Agents, and by E.Κourakis, lawyer)

Other party to the proceedings: Aristoteleio Panepistimio Thessalonikis (‘the University’)

Form of order sought

The appellant claims that the Court should:






—


Uphold the present appeal as well-founded and set aside the judgment under appeal in so far as it determined that (1) the amount of EUR 184 157 relating to personnel costs constitute eligible costs and (2) the indirect costs relating to such personnel costs, amounting to EUR 36 831.40, are eligible costs;










—


Re-examine the substance of Case Τ-348/16 OP (1) and dismiss the action brought by the University which gave rise to the judgment in Case Τ-348/16, in relation to its claim for the amount of EUR 184 157 together with EUR 36 831.40 and










—


Order the University to bear its own costs and to pay those of ERCEA in relation to these proceedings, and also in relation to the proceedings before the General Court.





Grounds of appeal and main arguments

In support of this appeal requesting that the judgment of the General Court be set aside, ERCEA relies on four main grounds of appeal:






1.


The first ground of appeal is that the General Court erred as followed:






i.


the General Court infringed the public interest rules of EU law and in particular the rules which relate to the 7th research framework programme, the legislation which governs that programme (for example Regulation (ΕC) Νο 1906/2006) and the Financial Regulation (‘the Rules’).










ii.


the General Court infringed the rules of interpretation, adopting a clearly erroneous and inadmissible interpretation of Grant Agreement Νο 211166 (‘the Agreement’), which is also incompatible with the Rules, and in that way acted unlawfully.










iii.


in the alternative, the General Court distorted the clear sense of the relevant provisions of the Agreement and consequently distorted the evidence produced before it.










iv.


the General Court failed to explain (1) why supervision is not required in the case of teleworking, or (2) why all forms of teleworking automatically satisfy the requirement of supervision, without the necessity of any additional measures (if we assume that it was accepted that supervision is equally required for teleworking).














2.


The second ground of appeal is that the General Court — if it correctly defined the legal conditions governing eligibility of the claim — accepted that the claim at issue was lawful on the basis that only one of the conditions (namely, the Condition on Actual Hours of Work) is satisfied for the reason (in its judgment) that ERCEA did not dispute it. In that way the General Court erred as follows:






i.


the General Court infringed the Rules.










ii.


the General Court also infringed the rules of the law that must be applied to contracts.










iii.


on the assumption that the General Court did not neglect to assess the other conditions (and that its approach to the subject was deliberate), the General Court also was in breach of the duty to state sufficient reasons in judgments.










iv.


In any event — and on the view that the General Court did not neglect to assess the other conditions and in fact implicitly examined them — the General Court infringed the rules on the burden of proof.














3.


The third ground of appeal is that the General Court considered that the employment contract between the University and researchers permitted teleworking and in that way committed a host of errors:






i.


the General Court infringed the rules of interpretation of agreements, adopting a clearly erroneous and inadmissible interpretation of the project agreements.










ii.


the General Court distorted the relevant evidence.










iii.


the General Court delivered a judgment which contained insufficient and contradictory reasoning in connection with the substantive subject matter of the case.














4.


The fourth ground of appeal is that the General Court erred for the following reasons:






i.


the General Court failed to examine the normal practices of the University in connection with teleworking and used the subject matter of its assessment (namely, the employment contract under consideration) as the point of reference for its assessment. In that way the General Court failed to state sufficient reasons, given that the statement of reasons was manifestly unfounded.










ii.


In the alternative, the General Court the rules in relation to proof and the legal sufficiency of statements of reasons for judgments, in that it failed to carry out an overall examination of what was the University’s normal practice in connection with the teleworking of its employees and failed to provide any details on that subject.










(1)  ECLI:EU:T:2019:14.