Judgment of the General Court of 15 September 2021 – Ashworth and Others v Parliament

(Joined Cases T-720/19 to T-725/19) ¹

(Law governing the institutions – Rules governing the payment of expenses and allowances to Members of the Parliament – Amendment of the additional voluntary pension scheme – Notice fixing additional voluntary pension rights – Plea of illegality – Competence of the Bureau of the Parliament – Rights acquired or in the process of being acquired – Proportionality – Equal treatment – Legal certainty)

Language of the case: French

Parties

Applicants: Richard Ashworth (Lingfield, United Kingdom) and the five other applicants whose names are listed in the annex to the judgment (represented by: A. Schmitt and A. Grosjean, lawyers)

Defendant: European Parliament (represented by: N. Görlitz, M. Ecker and S. Seyr, acting as Agents)

Re:

Application under Article 263 TFEU for annulment of the Parliament’s decisions contained in the notices fixing the applicants’ additional voluntary pension rights in so far as they introduce, for pensions established after 1 January 2019, a special levy of 5% of the nominal amount of the pension, payable directly to the additional voluntary pension fund, pursuant to the decision of the Bureau of the European Parliament of 10 December 2018 amending the Implementing Measures for the Statute for Members of the European Parliament (OJ 2018 C 466, p. 8).

Operative part of the judgment

The Court:

Joins Cases T-720/19 to T-725/19 for the purposes of the judgment;

Dismisses the actions;

Orders Mr Richard Ashworth and the other applicants whose names are listed in the annex to pay the costs.

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¹ OJ C 413, 9.12.2019.