Comité International de la Rayonne et des Fibres Synthétiques and others v Commission of the European Communities.
Date: 1993-03-24
20 In that regard, it should be noted that in its defence the Commission simply asks the Court to dismiss the action on the merits and does not contest the applicant' s locus standi. On the contrary, the Commission has argued that to deny competitors of an undertaking to which aid has been granted locus standi to contest a Commission decision refusing to initiate the procedure provided for in Article 93(2) of the Treaty would create a serious shortcoming in the system of legal redress provided for by Article 164 of the Treaty.
21 As far as the interveners' entitlement to raise the objection of inadmissibility is concerned, it should be noted that, according to the third paragraph of Article 37 of the Statute of the Court of Justice of the EEC, submissions made in an application to intervene may only have the purpose of supporting the submissions of one of the parties. In addition, Article 93(4) of the Rules of Procedure provides that the intervener must accept the case as he finds it at the time of his intervention.
22 It follows that the interveners were not entitled to raise the objection of inadmissibility, and that the Court is therefore not bound to consider the pleas on which they rely.
25 In that regard, it should be noted in the first place that, by taking the view that the aid was not subject to the prior notification procedure provided for by Article 93(3) of the Treaty, the Commission considered, on the one hand, that the aid in question did not fall within the scope of the discipline and, on the other, that as a regional planning grant covered by Decision 85/18, cited above, it constituted an existing aid.
26 Furthermore, that contested decision does not constitute a mere preparatory measure for which the possibility of bringing an action against the decision closing the procedure would afford sufficient protection in the event of its being unlawful. The decision refusing to initiate the procedure provided for by Article 93(2) of the Treaty is definitive and therefore cannot be characterized as a mere preparatory measure.
28 Secondly, in view of the fact that the addressee of the decision is the French Republic, and not the applicants, it should be considered whether the decision is of direct and individual concern to the applicants within the meaning of the second paragraph of Article 173 of the Treaty.
29 It is undisputed that CIRFS, an association whose membership consists of the main international manufacturers of synthetic fibres, has pursued, in the interest of those manufacturers, a number of actions connected with the policy of restructuring that sector. In particular, it has been the Commission' s interlocutor with regard to the introduction of the discipline and its extension and adaptation. Furthermore, during the procedure prior to these proceedings, CIRFS actively pursued negotiations with the Commission, in particular by submitting written observations to it and by keeping in close contact with the responsible departments.
30 The position of CIRFS in its capacity as negotiator of the discipline is therefore affected by the contested decision. It follows that the application is admissible as far as CIRFS is concerned (judgment in Joined Cases 67, 68 and 70/85 Van der Kooy and Others v Commission [1988] ECR 219).
34 In the first place, this case has to be distinguished from the Deufil case. That case was essentially concerned with the question whether the discipline at issue could embody a derogation from the rules of the Treaty, whereas the question arising in this case is whether such a discipline is capable of having binding effects. Consequently, the Court' s reasoning in Deufil cannot be transposed to this case.
35 Secondly, in this case the rules set out in the discipline and accepted by the Member States themselves have the effect, inter alia, of withdrawing from certain aid falling within its scope the authorization previously granted and hence of classifying it as new aid and subjecting it to the obligation of prior notification.
36 It follows that the fact that the discipline is the outcome of an agreement between the Member States and the Commission cannot alter the objective significance of its terms or its binding effect.
37 It is therefore necessary to consider the pleas in law put forward by the applicants.
38 In their first plea, the applicants argue that the discipline applied to industrial fibres at the time when the French Government maintains it took its decision, namely June 1989. They claim that the discipline has been applied since 1977 to the sector of synthetic fibres intended either for industrial or textile applications. In that regard, they base themselves in particular on the text of the discipline of 19 July 1977, which does make any distinction on the basis of the intended use of the fibres, and on the memorandum of 1978, in which the Commission stated that the scope of the discipline covered acrylic, polyester and polyamide fibres for either textile or industrial use.
39 In its defence and at the hearing, the Commission argued that the discipline was intended to avoid increases of production in sectors in which there was already overproduction and excess production capacity. However, there was only excess capacity in the sector of synthetic fibres for textile applications. Yet the Commission also conceded that initially it had stated that the scope of the discipline covered acrylic, polyester and polyamide fibres for either textile or industrial use. Furthermore, at the hearing it admitted, in the light of the wording of the aforementioned 1978 memorandum, that, at that time, the discipline covered all types of fibres.
40 It must therefore be held that in 1977, at the time when the discipline entered into force, its scope covered all types of synthetic fibres, including fibres intended for industrial applications.