Language of document :

Action brought on 9 October 2019 — European Parliament v Council of the European Union

(Case C-743/19)

Language of the case: Italian

Parties

Applicant: European Parliament (represented by: L. Visaggio, I. Anagnostopoulou, and C. Biz, acting as Agents)

Defendant: Council of the European Union

Form of order sought

The applicant claims that the Court should:

annul Decision (EU) 2019/1199 of 13 June 2019; 1

order Council of the European Union to pay the costs.

Pleas in law and main arguments

By its first plea in law, the Parliament claims that the author of the contested decision, be it the Council or all the Member States, does not have the power to determine the location of the seat of the European Labour Authority (ELA). The Parliament is of the opinion that:

Article 341 TFEU does not constitute an appropriate legal basis to determine the seat of bodies of the European Union such as decentralised agencies. In the present case, ELA was established by the EU legislature by Regulation (EU) 2019/1149, 2 adopted on the basis of Articles 46 and 48 TFUE by means of the ordinary legislative procedure. The Parliament considers that Article 341 TFEU cannot withdraw from the scope of competence of the EU legislature, which established ELA, the power to decide on the location of its seat, by attributing it instead to the Member States, and that therefore that provision cannot validily serve as the legal basis for the contested decision.

By the second plea in law, raised in the alternative in the event that the Court were to find that Article 341 TFEU provides an appropriate legal basis for the contested decision, the Parliament seeks to claim that that decision is vitiated by an absolute failure to state reasons. The Parliament considers that, as a legal act of the European Union, the constested decision is subject to the obligation to state reasons laid down in the second paragraph of Article 296 TFUE, which was not fulfilled in any way, since it utterly fails to specify the reasons why the city of Bratislava was chosen to host the seat of ELA.

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1     Decision (EU) 2019/1199 taken by common accord between the Representatives of the Governments of the Member States of 13 June 2019 on the location of the seat of the European Labour Authority (OJ 2019 L 189, p. 68).

2     Regulation (EU) 2019/1149 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 20 June 2019 establishing a European Labour Authority, amending Regulations (EC) No 883/2004, (EU) No 492/2011, and (EU) 2016/589 and repealing Decision (EU) 2016/344 (OJ 2019 L 186, p. 21).