ORDER OF THE CIVIL SERVICE TRIBUNAL (First Chamber)

11 September 2007

Case F-12/07

Elizabeth O’Connor

v

Commission of the European Communities

(Civil service – Other servants – Consecutive contracts as a member of the temporary staff, auxiliary staff and contract staff – Maximum period of payment of unemployment allowance – Admissibility)

Application: brought under Articles 236 EC and 152 EA, in which Mrs O’Connor seeks annulment of the Commission’s decision of 5 April 2006 setting the maximum period for the award of an unemployment allowance to her at 11 months and 25 days.

Held: The action is dismissed in part as manifestly inadmissible and in part as manifestly unfounded. The Commission is ordered to bear all the costs, including those of the applicant incurred in the context of her application for legal aid.

Summary

1.      Officials – Members of the temporary staff and contract staff – Unemployment allowance – Maximum period of payment

(Conditions of Employment of Other Servants, Arts 28a(4), 70 and 96(4))

2.      Procedure – Costs – Action in part manifestly inadmissible and in part manifestly unfounded

(Rules of Procedure of the Court of First Instance, Arts 87(3), first subpara., and 94(3))

1.      The provisions of Article 28a(4) and Article 96(4) of the Conditions of Employment of Other Servants laying down the maximum period during which, respectively, a former member of the temporary staff and a former member of the contract staff may be paid an unemployment allowance by the Communities do not apply to a former member of the auxiliary staff who, under Article 70 of those Conditions of Employment, is affiliated by the institution employing him to a national compulsory social security scheme and can therefore obtain payment of an unemployment allowance only from that scheme. The provisions of Article 28a(4) and Article 96(4) of the Conditions of Employment of Other Servants thus do not require the institution to take account, for the purposes of setting the maximum period for which an unemployment allowance is to be paid by the Communities, the periods during which the staff member concerned was employed as a member of the auxiliary staff.

(see para. 20)

2.      In a case where, as it was required to do by the provisions of Article 94(3) of the Rules of Procedure of the Court of First Instance, the Tribunal has rejected an application for legal aid because the action appeared manifestly inadmissible or manifestly unfounded, it is nevertheless appropriate, in the procedure dealing with the merits of the case, to apply the provisions of the first subparagraph of Article 87(3) of the Rules of Procedure and, exceptionally, to order the administration to pay, in addition to its own costs, all the costs incurred by the applicant, including any incurred in the context of his application for legal aid, in view of the applicant’s financial situation and the fact that, in the case in question, the contested decision contradicted, without explanation, the information previously provided by the relevant department .

(see paras 32-33)