CELEX: C2000/079/63
Language: en
Date: 2000-03-18 00:00:00
Title: Case T-319/99: Action brought on 10 November 1999 by the Federación Nacional de Empresas, Instrumentación Ciéntifica, Médica, Técnica y Dental (FENIN) against Commission of the European Communities

C 79/28               EN                      Official Journal of the European Communities                                       18.3.2000
      ORDER OF THE COURT OF FIRST INSTANCE                               Madrid, represented by Ramón Garcia-Gallardo and Gerard
                                                                         Pérez Olmo, of the Madrid and Barcelona Bars respectively, 19
                                                                         Square de Meeûs, Brussels.
                     of 6 December 1999
in Case T-178/99, Sonia Marion Elder and Robert Dale                     The applicant claims that the Court should:
   Elder v Commission of the European Communities (1)
                                                                         — annul the Commission’s decision (SG(99) D/7.040) of
(Transparency — Decision 94/90/ECSC, EC, Euratom, on                         26 August 1999;
public access to Commission documents — Advisory Com-
mittee on Value Added Tax — Decision refusing access to
documents — Withdrawal of contested measure — No need                    — order the Commission to pay the costs.
                          to adjudicate)
                         (2000/C 79/62)                                  Pleas in law and main arguments
                  (Language of the case: English)                        The applicant in the present case is a Spanish federation to
                                                                         which belong practically all the manufacturers, importers and
In Case T-178/99, Sonia Marion Elder and Robert Dale Elder,              distributors of health products in Spain. What all these
residing in Dundee, Scotland, United Kingdom, represented by             undertakings have in common is that they supply health
Scott Crosby, Solicitor, 9 Rond-Point Schuman, Brussels v                products to all Spanish medical institutions in both the public
Commission of the European Communities, represented by                   and private sector.
M.M. Ulrich Wölker and Xavier Lewis, application for annul-
ment of the decision of the Commission of 8 June 1999
refusing the applicants access to the minutes of the Advisory            The applicant is challenging the Commission’s decision not to
Committee on Value Added Tax, the Court of First Instance                take action on the complaint it lodged against the alleged
composed of B. Vesterdorf, President, C.W. Bellamy and M. Vi-            abuse of a dominant position by the Spanish ‘Entes Gestores
laras, Judges, Registrar; H. Jung, has made an order on                  del Sistema Nacional de Salud’ (SNS), in particular the delay in
6 December 1999 the operative part of which is as follows:               paying sums owed to the suppliers of health products. In its
                                                                         complaint, the applicant also referred to other abuses, such as
1. There is no need to adjudicate on the present application.            requests for additional services totally unrelated to the object
                                                                         of the contract and the imposition of maximum purchase
2. The Commission shall bear all the costs.                              prices to the detriment of the technical development of the
                                                                         sector.
(1) OJ C 281 of 2.10.1999.
                                                                         The applicant points out in this regard that sales to the SNS by
                                                                         undertakings belonging to FENIN represent in excess of 80 %
                                                                         of its business, which places the SNS in a dominant position
                                                                         as purchaser.
                                                                         In support of its arguments, the applicant claims that:
Action brought on 10 November 1999 by the Federación
Nacional de Empresas, Instrumentación Ciéntifica, Méd-                  — its rights of defence were infringed inasmuch as no
ica, Técnica y Dental (FENIN) against Commission of the                      investigation file was opened after a thorough analysis of
                    European Communities                                     the complaint;
                        (Case T-319/99)                                  — in the present case, there was a manifest error of assessment
                                                                             of the relevant elements of fact and law, especially of the
                         (2000/C 79/63)                                      nature of the economic activity of the management of the
                                                                             public service provided by the Social Security. The appli-
                                                                             cant states, in this regard, that the defendant has misapplied
                                                                             Articles 82 and 86 of the Treaty by misinterpreting the
                  (Language of the case: Spanish)
                                                                             judgment in Joined Cases C-159 and C-160/91 Poucet and
                                                                             Pistre (1), which, moreover, does not take into account
An action against the Commission of the European Communi-                    more recent case-law which takes a functional approach
ties was brought before the Court of First Instance of the                   to analysing anti-competitive conduct by public-law oper-
European Communities on 10 November 1999 by the Federa-                      ators which are in a manifestly dominant position in
ción Nacional de Empresas, Instrumentación Ciéntifica, Mé-                 such delicate economic areas such as telecommunications,
dica, Técnica y Dental (FENIN), whose registered office is at                postal services or electricity generation.
 ---pagebreak--- 18.3.2000              EN                    Official Journal of the European Communities                                       C 79/29
The applicant also criticizes what it considers to be an                Decision        contested      Refusal by the examiner to regis-
erroneous association made by the Commission between the                before the Board of            ter
principles of solidarity and redistribution within the public           Appeal:
health system, on the one hand, and requests to be supplied
by third-party, independent operators, on the other. In its             Pleas in law:                  — infringement of Article 7(1)(b)
view, extending the scope of distribution as a fundamental
                                                                                                           of Regulation (EC) No 40/94
element in the principle of solidarity to the point of demanding
sacrifices on the part of third-party suppliers is tantamount to                                       — misapplication of Article 7
placing a charge on the latter which is both discriminatory and                                            (1)(c) of Regulation (EC)
unjustified.                                                                                               No 40/94
(1) Joined Cases C-159 and C-160/91 Poucet and Pistre [1993] ECR
    I-637.
                                                                        Action brought on 25 November 1999 by Kasper Lund
                                                                                 Nielsen against the European Central Bank
Action brought on 23 November 1999 by Mitsubishi
HiTec Paper Bielefeld GmbH against the Office for Har-
monisation in the Internal Market (Trade marks and                                              (Case T-333/99)
                             Designs)
                                                                                                 (2000/C 79/65)
                         (Case T-331/99)
                          (2000/C 79/64)                                                  (Language of the case: German)
                                                                        An action against the European Central Bank was brought
                  (Language of the case: German)                        before the Court of First Instance of the European Communities
                                                                        on 25 November 1999 by Kasper Lund Nielsen, Frank-
An action against the Office for Harmonisation in the Internal          furt-am-Main, Germany, represented by Norbert Pflüger, Regi-
Market (Trade marks and Designs) was brought before the                 na Steiner and Silvia Mittländer of the Frankfurt am Main Bar,
Court of First Instance of the European Communities on                  with an address for service in Luxembourg at the office of
23 November 1999 by Mitsubishi HiTec Paper Bielefeld                    Aloyse Schiltz, Association Luxembourgeoise des Employés de
GmbH, Bielefeld, Germany (formerly Stora Carbonless Paper               Banques et d’Assurances, 29 Avenue Monterey, Luxembourg.
GmbH), represented by Ulrike Alice Ulrich, of Cohausz &
Florack, Düsseldorf, with an address for service in Luxembourg
at the office of Ernest T. Freylinger S.A., 234 Route d’Arlon,          The applicant claims that the Court should:
Luxembourg.
                                                                        1. Declare that his dismissal under Article 41 of the Con-
                                                                            ditions of Employment for Staff of the European Central
The applicant claims that the Court should:
                                                                            Bank (hereinafter ‘the CoE’), is ineffective and that the
                                                                            employment relationship between the applicant and the
— annul the decision of the Third Board of Appeal of                        defendant was not dissolved by the dismissal but continues
     8 September 1999 in Case R 175/1999-3 and order the                    to subsist as though notice had not been given;
     Office to publish the Community trade mark application in
     accordance with Article 10 of the Trade Mark Regulation;
                                                                        2. Order the defendant to continue to employ the applicant as
— order the defendant to pay the costs.                                     a documentalist on the contractual terms of employment;
                                                                        3. Order the defendant to pay the basic salary retained under
Pleas in law and main arguments                                             Article 44 of the CoE;
Trade mark:                   Word mark ‘Giroform’ — appli-             4. Declare the decision of the Management Committee, which
                              cation no 533406                              was notified to the applicant by letter of 9 November
                                                                            1999, invalid;
Goods or services:            Paper, cardboard and goods main-
                              ly from these materials included          5. Declare that the disciplinary proceedings brought against
                              in Class 16; printed matter                   the applicant under Article 43 of the CoE were unlawful.