ORDER OF THE CIVIL SERVICE TRIBUNAL

(First Chamber)

6 March 2008

Case F-55/07

Giuseppe Tiralongo

v

Commission of the European Communities

(Civil service – Former temporary agent – Actions – Action for damages – Non‑renewal of a fixed-term contract – Manifest inadmissibility)

Application: brought under Articles 236 EC and 152 EA, in which Mr Tiralongo seeks, in particular, an order requiring the Commission to compensate the material and non-material damage he allegedly suffered as a result of a series of unlawful actions which he claims the Commission committed in connection with the renewal of his contract.

Held: The action is dismissed as manifestly inadmissible. Each party is to bear its own costs.

Summary

1.      Procedure – Admissibility of actions – Assessment by reference to the rules in force when the application was lodged

(Rules of Procedure of the Civil Service Tribunal, Art. 76)

2.      Officials – Actions – Actions for damages – Pleas in law

(Staff Regulations, Arts 90 and 91)

1.      Although the rule laid down in Article 76 of the Rules of Procedure of the Civil Service Tribunal that the Tribunal may, by way of an order, dismiss an action which appears manifestly bound to fail is a procedural rule which, as such, applies to all proceedings pending before the Tribunal at the time when it enters into force, the same is not true of rules on the basis of which the Tribunal may, under that article, regard an action as manifestly inadmissible, and which may only be those applicable on the date when the action is brought.

(see para. 26)

2.      An official who has failed to bring, within the periods laid down in Articles 90 and 91 of the Staff Regulations, an action for annulment of a measure alleged to have adversely affected him cannot repair that omission and thus obtain further time for bringing proceedings by lodging a claim for compensation for the damage caused by that measure, whatever the material or non-material nature of that damage.

(see paras 31, 33, 40, 41)

See:

T-27/90 Latham v Commission [1991] ECR II‑35, para. 38; T-20/92 Moat v Commission [1993] ECR II‑799, para. 46; T-147/04 Ross v Commission [2005] ECR-SC I‑A‑171 and II‑771, para. 48