Ryanair Ltd v European Commission.
Date: 2013-06-13
68. Furthermore, to determine whether an act of the Commission in matters of State aid constitutes a decision within the meaning of Article 4 of Regulation No 659/1999, it is necessary to ascertain whether, taking account of the substance of that act and the Commission’s intention, that institution has, at the end of the preliminary examination stage, definitively established its position, by way of the act under consideration, on the measure under review (see Case C‑521/06 P Athinaïki Techniki  v Commission  [2008] ECR I‑5829, paragraph 46).
71. It should be noted, furthermore, that decisions adopted without initiating the formal investigation procedure are acts which are brought into being on conclusion of a brief review, which is conducted within a narrow time frame and, more often than not, in the context of a dialogue exclusive to the Commission and the Member State concerned. In accordance with the objective of Article 88(3) EC and its duty of sound administration, the Commission may, amongst other things, engage in dialogue with the notifying State or with third parties in an endeavour to overcome, during the preliminary procedure, any difficulties encountered. However, as the General Court noted in paragraph 78 of the judgment under appeal, that power presupposes that the Commission may adjust its position according to the results of the dialogue engaged in, without that adjustment having to be interpreted, a priori, as establishing the existence of serious difficulties.
72. Consequently, the General Court was fully entitled to hold, in paragraph 96 of the judgment under appeal, that the Commission had the power lawfully to adopt, on the basis of Article 4(2) of Regulation No 659/1999, a decision, such as the second contested decision, whereby, while finding the absence of State aid, it takes note of commitments entered into by the Member State.
78. By the first part of its third ground of appeal, Ryanair in reality seeks to call into question the findings of fact and the assessment of the evidence. However, under Article 256(1) TFEU and the first paragraph of Article 58 of the Statute of the Court of Justice, an appeal lies on points of law only. The General Court therefore has sole jurisdiction to establish and assess the relevant facts and to assess the evidence, save where such facts and evidence have been distorted (Case C‑403/10 P Mediaset  v Commission  [2011] ECR I‑0000, paragraph 73 and case‑law cited).
86. Concerning Ryanair’s argument that the statement of reasons in paragraph 120 of the judgment under appeal is incorrect, suffice it to note that it is directed against a ground of the judgment under appeal which is included merely for the sake of completeness. Complaints directed against grounds of a judgment of the General Court which are included merely for the sake of completeness must be rejected outright since such grounds cannot provide any basis for setting that judgment aside (see, inter alia, the judgment of 21 March 2013 in Case C‑405/11 P Commission  v Buczek Automotive [2013], paragraph 65 and case-law cited).
110. It should be recalled that the duty incumbent upon the General Court under Article 36 and the first paragraph of Article 53 of the Statute of the Court to state reasons for its judgments does not require the General Court to provide an account that follows exhaustively and one by one all the arguments articulated by the parties to the case. The reasoning may therefore be implicit, on condition that it enables the interested parties to know the grounds upon which the General Court relied and provides the Court with sufficient material for it to exercise its powers of review on appeal (Case C‑320/09 P A2A  v Commission  [2011] ECR I‑0000, paragraph 97 and case-law cited).