Joined Cases T‑530/22 to T‑533/22
Magistrats européens pour la démocratie et les libertés (Medel)
International Association of Judges
Association of European Administrative Judges
Stichting Rechters voor Rechters
v
Council of the European Union
Order of the General Court (Grand Chamber) of 4 June 2024
(Actions for annulment – Regulation (EU) 2021/241 of the European Parliament and of the Council – Council Implementing Decision of 17 June 2022 on the approval of the assessment of the recovery and resilience plan for Poland – Lack of direct concern – Inadmissibility)
1. Action for annulment – Natural or legal persons – Acts which are of direct and individual concern to them – Action brought by an association – Admissibility – Criteria
(Art. 263, fourth para., TFEU)
(see paragraph 40)
2. Action for annulment – Natural or legal persons – Acts which are of direct and individual concern to them – Action by a professional association set up to protect and represent its members – Direct concern – Criteria – Associations representing the interests of their members who themselves are entitled to bring proceedings – No direct link between the contested act and its effects on the persons represented by the applicant associations – Inadmissibility
(Art. 263, fourth para., TFEU)
(see paragraphs 62-89, 93, 109)
3. Action for annulment – Natural or legal persons – Acts which are of direct and individual concern to them – Direct concern – Criteria – No possibility of calling into question the conditions for admissibility by relying on the right to effective judicial protection – No possibility of easing the conditions for admissibility in order to remedy as soon as possible the infringements committed by a Member State in respect of the rule of law crisis
(Arts 2 and 19(1), second subpara., TEU; Arts 263, fourth para., and 266 TFEU; Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union, Art. 47)
(see paragraphs 113-115, 117, 118)
Résumé
Sitting as the Grand Chamber, the General Court dismisses as inadmissible actions brought by four associations of judges (1) seeking annulment of the Council Implementing Decision on the approval of the assessment of the recovery and resilience plan for the Republic of Poland. (2)
The applicants are associations representing judges at international level whose members are, as a general rule, national professional associations, including Polish associations of judges.
On 12 February 2021, the European Parliament and the Council of the European Union adopted Regulation 2021/241 establishing the Recovery and Resilience Facility (‘the Facility’). (3) Under the Facility, funds may be granted to the Member States, in the form of a financial contribution, which consists in non-repayable financial support or is in the form of a loan.
By the contested decision, the Council approved the assessment of the recovery and resilience plan for the Republic of Poland and specified, in the annex, the milestones and targets to be achieved by that Member State in order for the financial contribution made available to it in the contested decision to be released. The first part of that annex includes, inter alia, the measures regarding the reform of justice in Poland which are set out in milestones F1G, F2G and F3G. (4) The applicants disputed the contested decision in so far as the milestones are incompatible with EU law.
By its order, the Court upholds the plea of inadmissibility raised by the Council, pursuant to Article 130(1) of the Rules of Procedure of the General Court, and, accordingly, dismisses the applicants’ actions.
Findings of the Court
As a preliminary point, the Court observes that, in so far as the contested decision is addressed to the Republic of Poland, the admissibility of the actions must be examined in the light of the second and third limbs of the fourth paragraph of Article 263 TFEU, in which the condition of direct concern is laid down. (5)
The Court examines, first of all, the admissibility of the applicants’ actions acting in their own name.
In that regard, the Court finds that no legal provision relating to the Facility grants them that procedural right. Similarly, the fact that they are involved as regular interlocutors with the EU institutions on the issue of judicial independence does not provide them with standing to bring proceedings.
Next, the Court examines the admissibility of the applicants’ actions acting on behalf of their members whose interests they defend.
In that regard, the applicants differentiate three groups of judges, including, in particular, the Polish judges affected by decisions of the Disciplinary Chamber who, in the applicants’ view, are directly concerned by the review proceedings envisaged in milestones F2G and F3G, all of the Polish judges who they claim are directly concerned by those review proceedings and by milestone F1G, and all the other European judges who they claim are also directly concerned by those milestones.
As regards the judges in the first group, the Court examines, in the first place, the substance of the contested decision, assessed in the light of its content and context.
It notes that the contested decision makes the payment of a financial contribution subject to compliance with conditions, namely the implementation of the recovery and resilience plans assessed by the European Commission and approved by the Council, including the attainment of milestones and targets, which are measures of progress made in the implementation of a reform. Since milestones F1G, F2G and F3G are of a budgetary conditionality nature in that the achievement of those milestones is a condition for obtaining funding under the Facility, they reflect the relationship between respect for the value of the rule of law, on the one hand, and the efficient implementation of the EU budget, in accordance with the principles of sound financial management and the protection of the European Union’s financial interests, on the other.
However, when setting those milestones, the Council was not seeking to replace the rules on the value of the rule of law or on effective judicial protection, as clarified by the case-law of the Court of Justice. It follows that, by establishing those milestones, the Council was not seeking to authorise the Republic of Poland not to comply with judgments of the Court of Justice finding that the Republic of Poland had failed to respect the value of the rule of law or the principle of effective judicial protection.
In the light of those assessments, the General Court examines, in the second place, whether the contested decision directly concerns the judges in the first group in the light of milestone F2G. It observes that, in order for the judges affected by the decisions of the Disciplinary Chamber to be directly concerned, there must be a direct link between the contested decision and its effects on those judges.
In that regard, milestone F2G merely imposes a condition to be satisfied by the Republic of Poland in order to be eligible for funding. The contested decision did not have the effect of making the judges affected by decisions of the Disciplinary Chamber subject to the conditions laid down in the contested decision, nor did the latter render a specific rule directly applicable to those judges. Therefore, by providing for milestone F2G, it did not definitively impose specific obligations on the Republic of Poland’s relations with the judges affected by decisions of the Disciplinary Chamber and there is no direct link.
Consequently, even after the adoption of the contested decision, the situation of the judges affected by decisions of the Disciplinary Chamber remained governed by the relevant provisions of Polish law applicable to that situation as well as by the provisions of EU law and the judgments of the Court of Justice, without milestone F2G set out in that decision directly altering the legal situation of those judges, in the sense required by the fourth paragraph of Article 263 TFEU.
As regards the judges in the second group, the General Court finds that the applicants have not demonstrated that there is a sufficiently close link between the situation of all Polish judges and milestone F1G. As regards the judges in the third group, the Court also rejects the applicants’ argument that milestones F1G, F2G and F3G directly concern all other European judges.
Thus, given that the judges whose interests the applicants defend are not entitled to bring proceedings themselves, the applicants have also failed to satisfy the conditions for their actions to be admissible.
Lastly, the Court rejects the applicants’ argument that the conditions for admissibility should be eased. Such easing would be contrary both to the fourth paragraph of Article 263 TFEU and to the case-law of the Court of Justice. The systemic deficiencies in the judicial system in Poland alleged by the applicants cannot, in any event, justify the General Court derogating from the condition of direct concern which applies to actions brought by natural or legal persons.
The Court states that that finding is without prejudice to the Republic of Poland’s obligation, in accordance with the second subparagraph of Article 19(1) TEU and Article 266 TFEU, to remedy as soon as possible the infringements found by the Court of Justice as regards the rule of law crisis. Similarly, that decision does not affect the possibility for the Member States and the EU institutions to bring an action against any provisions adopted by the institutions, bodies, offices and agencies of the European Union which are intended to have binding legal effects; nor does it affect the Commission’s actions aimed at contributing to ensure compliance with the requirements resulting from the EU rules on the rule of law.