JUDGMENT OF THE COURT OF FIRST INSTANCE (First Chamber)

6 February 2007

Case T-143/04

Antonietta Camurato Carfagno

v

Commission of the European Communities

(Civil service – Officials – Reporting procedure – Career development report – 2001/2002 appraisal exercise – Action for annulment – Plea of illegality – Manifest error of assessment)

Application: for annulment of the decision of 9 April 2003 drawing up the definitive version of the applicant’s career development report in respect of the period from 1 July 2001 to 31 December 2002.

Held: The decision of 9 April 2003 drawing up the definitive version of the applicant’s career development report in respect of the period from 1 July 2001 to 31 December 2002 is annulled. The Commission is ordered to pay the costs.

Summary

1.      Officials – Reports procedure – Career development report

(Staff Regulations, Art. 43)

2.      Officials – Reports procedure – Staff report – Assessors’ discretion

(Staff Regulations, Art. 43)

3.      Officials – Reports procedure – Internal directive of an institution

(Staff Regulations, Art. 43)

4.      Officials – Reports procedure – Career development report – Assessors’ discretion

(Staff Regulations, Art. 43)

1.      The fact that, in drawing up career development reports, reporting officers must take account of a target average is not contrary to Article 43 of the Staff Regulations. On the contrary, the target average system, as introduced in the General Provisions for Implementing Article 43 of the Staff Regulations adopted by the Commission, which require the directorates-general to evaluate their staff while keeping the average at 14 out of 20, is such as to further the freedom of the officers reporting on the officials under appraisal and to promote the award of a mark representative of the merits of those officials.

Furthermore, the system does not limit the possibility given to reporting officers to rate the assessments made of the performance of each individual official according to the extent to which his or her performance is above or below that average, and the target average does not prevent the reporting officers from making full use of the range of scores from 0 to 20. In order to observe the target average, the reporting officers are not required to offset scores above the average with scores below it.

Nor is it an infringement of Article 43 of the Staff Regulations to have three reference ranges corresponding to indicative percentages of the staff and allowing different rates of career progression, with 17-20 points (rapid promotion) for a maximum of 15% of the staff, 12-16 points (normal promotion) for around 75% of the staff, and 10-11 points (slow promotion) for a maximum of 10% of the staff.

(see paras 9, 10, 63)

See: T‑43/04 Fardoom and Reinard v Commission [2005] ECR-SC I‑A‑329 and II‑1465, paras 52, 53, 56 and 58 to 62

2.      In drawing up career development reports, the assessors or reporting officers have the widest discretion when judging the work of persons upon whom they must report or whom they must assess, and it is not for the court to interfere with their assessments save in the case of error or manifest exaggeration.

(see para. 67)

See: 36/81, 37/81 and 218/81 Seton v Commission [1983] ECR 1789, para. 23; T‑281/03 Liakoura v Council [2004] ECR-SC I‑A‑61 and II‑249, para. 40

3.      The guide for the (transitional) 2001/2002 staff appraisal exercise adopted by the Commission and containing information on the provisional rules applicable during the period of transition from one reporting system to another cannot take precedence over the General Provisions for Implementing Article 43 of the Staff Regulations which that institution adopted.

(see para. 71)

See: T‑198/04 Merladet v Commission [2005] ECR-SC I‑A‑403 and II‑1833, paras 41 to 43

4.      In a procedure for assessing an official, the reporting officers commit a manifest error of assessment where, in order to facilitate the promotion of ‘needy colleagues’ on the same grade as that official in his directorate-general, they seek to reserve merit marks for those colleagues and feel, wrongly, that they are restricted by the target mark in their freedom to assess the performance of the official in question, whereas, on the contrary, the target mark enhances that freedom.

(see paras 81, 85)

See: Fardoom and Reinard v Commission