ECJ 1. Officials – recruitment – competition – selection board – refusal to admit to a competition – inaccurate assessment of a doubtful administrative situation – duty of the selection board to investigate of its own motion – absence – unlawfulness of the decision (staff regulations, annex iii, art. 5)
2. Procedure – costs – each party to pay its own costs – exceptional circumstance (rules of procedure, art. 69 (3), first subparagraph)
1. Whilst a selection board responsible for the management of a competition for which there is a large number of candidates cannot be criticized for not taking the initiative of clarifying of its own motion the administrative situation, not yet determined when it made its decision, of a candidate whom it refused to admit, where it is established that there has been an error in its assessment the decision in question must be annulled in order to enable the administration to take a fresh decision which accords with the candidate ‘ s situation as subsequently acknowledged by it.
2. It would be inequitable to allow an official who has obtained the annulment of a decision of a selection board refusing to admit him to a competition to burden the institution in question with the costs of legal proceedings which he could have avoided by care to inform the selection board, which gave its decision on the basis of an administrative situation not then determined, of concurrent proceedings commenced by him through official channels in order to obtain rectification of that situation. The power given to the court under the first subparagraph of article 69 (3) of the rules of procedure should be exercised and the parties should be ordered to pay their own costs.
Citations:
C-797/79, C-797/79, [1980] EUECJ C-797/79
Links:
European, Employment
Updated: 21 May 2022; Ref: scu.132959
