Joined Cases T‑504/16 and T‑505/16

Jean-Pierre Bodson and Others

v

European Investment Bank

(Civil service — EIB staff — Remuneration — Annual adjustment of the scale of basic salaries — Calculation method — Economic and financial crisis)

Summary — Judgment of the General Court (Ninth Chamber), 14 September 2017

1.      Actions brought by officials — Staff of the European Investment Bank — Action directed against a measure of general scope — Inadmissibility

(Staff Regulations of the European Investment Bank, Art. 41)

2.      Officials — Staff of the European Investment Bank — Remuneration — Annual adjustment of the scale of basic salaries — Administration’s discretion — Adoption of a decision on the matter — Consequences — Self-limitation on the discretionary power

(Staff Regulations of the European Investment Bank, Art. 20, first para., and Annex I; EIB’s Internal Regulations of the European Investment Bank, Art. 31)

3.      Actions brought by officials — Judgment annulling a measure — Effects — Obligation to implement — Scope — Judgment annulling a decision making an annual adjustment of salaries resulting from the scale of basic salaries — Applicant claiming compensation for material damage suffered — Premature nature of the claim

(Art. 266 TFEU)

1.      See the text of the decision.

(see paras 35-37)

2.      Relations between the European Investment Bank and its staff, even though contractual in origin, are essentially governed by regulations. Under Article 31 of the EIB’s internal regulations and the first paragraph of Article 20 of its Staff Regulations, the Bank has a discretion in establishing and unilaterally changing the components of staff remuneration and consequently in setting and updating the scale of basic staff salaries.

However, in the exercise of that discretion, the EIB may determine in advance the criteria which are to apply for a given period of time to periodic adjustments of the scale of basic staff salaries, and may thus commit itself to observing such criteria when making annual adjustments to the scale over the course of that period.

In that regard, where the Bank adopts a unilateral decision on a method for calculating yearly adjustments to the scale of basic salaries, the purpose of which was to provide a framework for, and thus restrict its discretionary power, the Bank binds itself, for the period of validity of that decision, in the exercise of its discretion under the Staff Regulations, to comply with the method adopted. Consequently, the EIB cannot rely, in the context of the annual adjustment of the scale of basic staff salaries, on a discretion going beyond the criteria laid down in that method.

(see paras 46-49, 53, 60)

3.      See the text of the decision.

(see para. 76)