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Statistics concerning the judicial activity of the Court of Justice - 2023

PDF See detailed statistics for the Court of Justice 

A brief overview of the main statistical trends in 2023

By Marc-André Gaudissart, Deputy Registrar of the Court of Justice

This contribution, which was previously included in the body of the Institution’s Annual Report, is intended, as it is every year, to provide a brief overview of the main trends that emerge from a reading of the judicial statistics for the past year. It looks at the subject matter, origin and nature of the cases brought before the Court in 2023 and provides some keys to understanding the data relating to the cases closed by the Court in the course of that year.

Cases brought

The number of cases brought before the Court of Justice in 2023 is just one short of the exact average of the last three years: in 2023, 821 new cases were registered, 15 more than in 2022 (806 cases) and 17 fewer than in 2021 (838 cases). The breakdown of litigation by type of case is also broadly similar to that of previous years – references for a preliminary ruling and appeals alone still account for more than 90% of all cases brought before the Court (518 new references for a preliminary ruling and 231 appeals, appeals on interim measures or appeals on intervention were registered in 2013) – but what will particularly catch the reader’s eye is the increase in the number of direct actions brought before the Court in 2023.

While that number hit an all-time low in 2021, with only 29 new cases, it rose to 60 in 2023, more than double. That increase is ascribable in part to the increase in the number of actions for annulment (eight such actions were registered in 2023 – compared with just two in 2022 – seven of which were brought by one Member State alone (Poland) against acts adopted by the EU legislature in the areas of environmental protection and energy efficiency). It is also due to the upswing in the number of actions for failure of a Member State to fulfil obligations; in 2023, the Commission decided to initiate several parallel infringement proceedings for non-transposition or non-notification of measures by certain Member States to fulfil their obligations under the Treaties. Here, too, a not inconsiderable share of those cases concern the environment (conservation of natural habitats and of wild fauna and flora, introduction of a system to monitor invasive alien species, promotion of the use of energy from renewable sources, urban waste water treatment, waste treatment, and so forth), although several of them also deal with the more traditional areas of free movement of people and goods, transport, copyright and related rights in the digital single market, and measures for the effective protection of whistleblowers. [1]

As regards preliminary rulings, it is unsurprising – given the general geopolitical context and the numerous hotbeds of armed conflict on the European Union’s doorstep – that the bulk of the questions submitted to the Court in 2023 concerned the area of freedom, security and justice (82 requests for a preliminary ruling), including a significant number relating to the interpretation of the rules on the right to asylum and the international protection regime for third-country nationals. As in 2022, many of the questions referred to the Court last year for a preliminary ruling involved the fields of taxation, consumer protection and transport (with 53, 52 and 40 requests, respectively), whereas the appeals lodged in 2023 against decisions of the General Court were, for the most part, concerned with the fields of intellectual property, competition, State aid and the civil service. Despite the emergence of new areas of litigation, those fields still account for a significant proportion of the General Court’s workload.

As regards the geographical origin of the references for a preliminary ruling received by the Court in 2023, it should be noted that the courts of all the Member States, without exception, submitted questions to the Court last year, which is a testament to the robustness of the ‘court-to-court’ dialogue established by the Treaties. As in previous years, the German courts continue to occupy the top spot in the ‘geographical ranking’ of references (having submitted 94 requests for a preliminary ruling to the Court in 2023), but on this occasion, they are followed not by the Italian courts but by their Bulgarian and Polish counterparts, which submitted 51 and 48 requests respectively to the Court last year. In the case of Poland, the number of references for a preliminary ruling made in 2023 is at its highest since that country joined the European Union 20 years ago, while the number of references from the Bulgarian courts in 2023 is close to the record set by them in 2021 (58 requests).

A similar observation can be made with regard to requests for a preliminary ruling from Romania. With no fewer than 40 requests submitted to the Court in 2023, the Romanian courts have in fact made a high number of references, also reminiscent of the peak reached in 2019, when 49 requests for a preliminary ruling were sent to the Court. The questions referred by the Romanian courts in 2023 concern matters as diverse as the tariff classification of fibre optic cables, food safety, the protection of consumers against unfair terms in credit agreements denominated in a foreign currency, the right to deduct value added tax, the reimbursement of medical expenses incurred in a Member State other than the State of affiliation, and the delicate relationship between national standards for the protection of fundamental rights and respect for the principles of primacy, unity and effectiveness of EU law.

In the area of urgent litigation, as in 2022, there were significantly fewer applications for the expedited procedure or the urgent procedure than in 2021. While 2021 saw as many as 90 such applications, all types of cases combined, only 41 applications to expedite proceedings were made in 2023. The Court did not apply the expedited procedure at all in 2023, whereas the urgent preliminary ruling procedure was triggered on two occasions in cases concerning, respectively, the interpretation of Article 5(1) of Council Directive 2003/86/EC of 22 September 2003 on the right to family reunification (OJ 2003 L 251, p. 12), read in conjunction with Articles 7 and 24 of the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union, [2] and the interpretation of Article 325(1) TFEU, Article 2(1) of the Convention on the protection of the European Communities’ financial interests, signed in Brussels on 26 July 1995, and the principle of primacy of EU law. [3]

The opposite trend can be observed with regard to appeals. While 9 appeals on interim measures or on intervention were brought before the Court in 2021, 18 such appeals were lodged in 2023, in other words, twice as many.

Closed cases

Mirroring the trend set by the number of cases brought, the number of cases closed by the Court of Justice in 2023 is in line with the average for the last three years. Over the past year, the Court closed 783 cases compared with 771 in 2021 and 808 in 2022. Reflecting their share of cases brought before the Court, references for a preliminary ruling and appeals unsurprisingly constitute the bulk of the cases closed by the Court in 2023.

A closer look at the way in which cases were closed over the past year reveals a high degree of similarity to 2022. Whereas the Court delivered 466 judgments and 265 orders of all types in 2022, the figures for 2023 stand at 469 and 253 respectively, virtually unchanged from the previous year. That same trend can be observed with regard to orders involving a judicial determination terminating the case, other than orders removing a case from the register, declaring that there is no need to adjudicate or referring a case back to the General Court. The Court made 167 such orders in 2022 and 163 in 2023, but their breakdown by type of case is slightly different.

Whereas, in 2022, 12.7% of preliminary ruling cases were closed by means of an order adopted on the basis of Article 53(2) or Article 99 of the Rules of Procedure, or on the basis of a combination of those two provisions, that percentage rose last year to 14.6%. On the other hand, as regards appeals, the percentage of cases closed by means of an order under Articles 181 or 182 of the Rules of Procedure is on the decrease, falling from 56.8% in 2022 to 45.9% in 2023. That variation is due to the closure, in 2023, of a higher number of appeals by way of judgment, since several complex cases required a hearing and/or the delivery of an Advocate General’s Opinion.

Although appeals resulted in a higher number of judgments in 2023 than in 2022, that does not mean, however, that there is an upturn in the number of decisions of the General Court being set aside. Recent years have been marked by a high degree of stability in the outcome of appeals, irrespective of how they were closed. Of the 201 appeals closed in 2023, 37 led to the decision of the General Court being set aside and only 10 resulted in the case being referred back to the General Court. Again, the figures are broadly comparable to those of the previous year: in 2022, the General Court’s decisions were set side on 39 occasions (out of a total of 196 appeals closed) and the Court of Justice referred the case back to the General Court on only 9 occasions.

As in 2022, the number of cases closed by three-judge Chambers – including the Chamber determining whether appeals should proceed – account for more than half of all cases closed by the Court in 2023 (leaving aside orders removing a case from the register, declaring that there is no need to adjudicate or referring a case back to the General Court). It should be noted, however, that the proportion of cases closed by five-judge Chambers increased over the past year – 298 in 2023 compared with 270 the previous year – while the proportion of cases closed by the Grand Chamber has halved, falling from 80 in 2022 to just 36 in 2023. That trend is not only the consequence of a more selective approach on the part of the Court to cases requiring the intervention of the Grand Chamber based on, in particular, the volume and complexity of the cases brought before the Court; it is also ascribable to the existence of well-established case-law in certain areas, making it easier than it was in the past to refer cases to a smaller formation of five judges.

As regards the length of proceedings, the overall average time taken to deal with cases, all types combined, is down slightly on the previous year, standing at 16.1 months in 2023 compared with 16.4 months in 2022. That reduction is mainly due to the decrease in the average time taken to deal with direct actions (from 23.5 months in 2022 to 20.8 months in 2023) and, to a lesser extent, references for a preliminary ruling (from 17.3 months to 16.8 months). The average time taken to deal with cases nevertheless remains dependent on the complexity of the cases submitted to the Court and the way in which they are closed, which explains the importance the Court attached to its request to the EU legislature of 30 November 2022 to effect a partial transfer of the preliminary ruling jurisdiction of the Court of Justice to the General Court and to extend the material scope of the preliminary mechanism to determine whether an appeal should proceed.

Pending cases

As of 31 December 2023, there were 1 149 cases pending before the Court of Justice, around 40 more than the previous year. With the lion’s share of those cases being taken up by requests for a preliminary ruling (760 cases) and appeals (289 cases), the implementation of the reform mentioned above will inevitably have an impact on the figures since it will result, when it comes into force, in new references for a preliminary ruling in certain areas being transferred to the General Court.

[1] In 2023, the Commission brought actions against six Member States for failure to adopt or notify the laws, regulations and administrative provisions necessary to comply with Directive (EU) 2019/1937 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 23 October 2019 on the protection of persons who report breaches of Union law (OJ 2019 L 305, p. 17). See Cases C‑147/23, C‑149/23, C‑150/23, C‑152/23, C‑154/23 and C‑155/23 (actions brought against the Republic of Poland, the Federal Republic of Germany, the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg, the Czech Republic, the Republic of Estonia and Hungary, respectively).

[2] See judgment of 18 April 2023 in Case C‑1/23 PPU, Afrin (EU:C:2023:296).

[3] See judgment of 24 July 2023 in Case C‑107/23 PPU, Lin (EU:C:2023:606).

See also

Statistics of judicial activity in a number of previous years can also be consulted on the Curia website in the ‘History' section.