CELEX: C2001/212/47
Language: en
Date: 2001-07-28 00:00:00
Title: Order of the President of the Court of First Instance of 2 April 2001 in Case T-24/01 R: Claire Staelen v European Parliament and Council of the European Union (Application for interim relief — Officials — Non-admission to later stages of a competition — Urgency — None)

28.7.2001               EN                     Official Journal of the European Communities                                        C 212/25
ORDER OF THE PRESIDENT OF THE COURT OF FIRST                              The applicant claims that the Court should:
                             INSTANCE
                                                                          —      annul Article 1(1) and (3) and Article 3 of the Com-
                          of 2 April 2001                                        mission’s decision C(2000) 2466 final of 26 July 2000 (1),
                                                                                 in so far as the Commission declares therein that the aid
                                                                                 granted by Germany for project 1014, amounting to
in Case T-24/01 R: Claire Staelen v European Parliament                          DEM 701 664,50, is incompatible with the common
              and Council of the European Union                                  market;
(Application for interim relief — Officials — Non-admission               —      order the Commission to pay the costs.
     to later stages of a competition — Urgency — None)
                          (2001/C 212/47)                                 Pleas in law and main arguments
                    (Language of the case: French)                        In 1996 the applicant acquired the mobile radio products
                                                                          division of the German company FUBA Hans Kolbe & Co.
In Case T-24/01 R: Claire Staelen, member of the temporary                That company had collaborated, during the period from
staff of the European Parliament, residing in Bridel (Luxem-              1994 to 1996, in a research and development project (pro-
bourg), represented by J. Choucroun, lawyer, with an address              ject 1014) implemented by a subsidiary of the SICAN Group
for service in Luxembourg, against European Parliament                    in relation to repeater systems in the Land of Lower Saxony.
(Agents: Y. Pantalis and J.F. De Wachter) and Council of the              The Land of Lower Saxony had promoted that project by
European Union (Agents: F. Anton and A. Pilette) — appli-                 granting State aid, which the Commission held, in the contest-
cation, essentially, for an order suspending the procedure                ed decision, to be incompatible with the common market. The
recruiting successful candidates in competition EUR/A/151/98              Land thereupon demanded the return of the amount of the
to recruit French-speaking administrators, organised by the               aid.
European Parliament, and an order requiring the Parliament
and the Council, together, to produce all the minutes relating
to the tests in that competition and to reply to a number of              The applicant maintains that the defendant has committed a
questions put by the applicant — the President of the Court of            significant breach of its obligation to provide a statement of
First Instance made an order on 2 April 2001, the operative               reasons, as prescribed by Article 253 EC. It claims that, in the
part of which is as follows:                                              context of the legal assessment contained in its decision, the
                                                                          defendant devoted only three sentences to project 1014 and
1.    The application is dismissed;                                       provided no reasons whatsoever as to why the project did not
                                                                          fulfil the criteria of industrial research within the meaning of
2.    Costs are reserved.                                                 Annex I to the Community framework (2).
                                                                          Furthermore, the contested decision is contrary to
                                                                          Article 87(3)(c) EC. It wrongly concludes that project 1014
                                                                          fulfils neither the criteria of industrial research nor those of
                                                                          competitive development. The defendant was not entitled to
                                                                          deny that project 1014 involved precompetitive development
                                                                          by arguing that that project concerned the development of a
Action brought on 22 March 2001 by Huber + Suhner                         commercial repeater system. The project resulted in the
MRS GmbH against the Commission of the European                           development only of prototypes for essential components of
                            Communities                                   the repeater system. The research activities were limited to
                                                                          preparatory work, and the prototypes developed by the project
                           (Case T-68/01)                                 partners were not yet capable of being used for commercial
                                                                          purposes. Consequently, the defendant has infringed the
                                                                          Community framework by concluding that project 1014 went
                          (2001/C 212/48)                                 beyond the stage of precompetitive development.
                   (Language of the case: German)
                                                                          (1) OJ 2001 L 18, p. 18.
An action against the Commission of the European Communi-                 (2) Community framework for state aid for research and development
                                                                              (OJ 1996 C 45, p. 5).
ties was brought before the Court of First Instance of the
European Communities on 22 March 2001 by Huber + Suhner
MRS GmbH, of Bad Salzdetfurth (Germany), represented by
Hans-Jörg Niemeyer and Egbert Wilms, Rechtsanwälte, with
an address for service in Luxembourg.