ORDER OF THE EUROPEAN UNION CIVIL SERVICE TRIBUNAL
(Third Chamber)

28 February 2013

Case F‑33/12

Jean Pepi

v

European Research Council Executive Agency (ERCEA)

(Civil service — Contract staff — Contract staff for auxiliary tasks — Recruitment — Grading on recruitment — Articles 3a, 3b and 86 of the Conditions of Employment — ERCEA — Internal rules on the grading of members of the contract staff)

Application:      brought under Article 270 TFEU, applicable to the EAEC Treaty pursuant to Article 106a thereof, whereby Mr Pepi seeks annulment of the contract signed on 3 October 2011 with the European Research Council Executive Agency (ERCEA), in that it provides for his grading in grade 10, step 1, of Function Group III, and an order that ERCEA pay him damages for the harm allegedly sustained.

Held: The action is dismissed as manifestly unfounded. The applicant is to bear his own costs and is ordered to pay the costs incurred by ERCEA. The Council of the European Union, intervener, is ordered to bear its own costs.

Summary

Officials — Equal treatment — Differentiated treatment of different categories of staff with respect to guarantees provided for in the Staff Regulations and social security benefits — No discrimination

(Conditions of Employment of Other Servants, Arts 3a and 3b; Council Directive 1999/70)

As the EU legislature is free to create new categories of staff, corresponding to legitimate needs of the administration of the Union, the differences in status between the different categories of persons employed by the Union, either as officials or in the various categories of staff governed by the Conditions of Employment of Other Servants, cannot be called into question, since the definition of each of those categories corresponds to legitimate needs of the administration of the Union and to the nature of the permanent or temporary tasks which it is required to fulfil. Accordingly, the fact that certain categories of persons employed by the Union enjoy guarantees in terms of duration of employment or financial advantages which are not given to other categories cannot be regarded as discrimination.

In particular, the differences in employment conditions between members of the contract staff within the meaning of Article 3a of the Conditions of Employment of Other Servants and members of the contract staff for auxiliary tasks coming within Article 3b of those conditions of employment provide justification for their being given different gradings and, accordingly, different levels of remuneration. The relatively precarious nature of their posts may thus provide justification for contract staff for auxiliary staff being placed in more favourable grades than members of the contract staff within the meaning of Article 3a of the Conditions of Employment of Other Servants. It follows that there can be no question of unequal treatment even where members of the contract staff within the meaning of Article 3a and members of the contract staff within the meaning of Article 3b in the same function group are called upon to carry out the same tasks and where recruitment within the same function group of those two categories of contract staff requires the same level of diploma or professional experience.

Nor, moreover, as the situation of members of the contract staff within the meaning of Article 3a of the Conditions of Employment of Other Servants is not comparable to that of contract staff for auxiliary tasks, can there be any question of an infringement of Directive 1999/70 concerning the framework agreement on fixed-term work concluded by ETUC, UNICE and CEEP. 

(see paras 40-41, 43-44, 58)

See:

6 October 1983, 118/82 to 123/82 Celant and Others v Commission, para. 22

30 September 1998, T‑121/97 Ryan v Court of Auditors, paras 98 and 104

21 September 2011, T‑325/09 P Adjemian and Others v Commission, paragraph 83 and the case-law cited

19 October 2006, F‑59/05 De Smedt v Commission, paras 71 and 76; 12 March 2009, F‑104/06 Arpaillange and Others v Commission, paras 60, 61 and 63