Court
annuls votes of European Parliament concerning Parliament’s calendar of periods
of part-sessions for 2012 and 2013, on the ground that those periods, split
into two parts by the Parliament, cannot be regarded individually as periods
of monthly plenary part-sessions.
>> The Treaties require the European
Parliament to meet in 12 monthly plenary
part-sessions per year in Strasbourg, including the budgetary session. However,
they do not prescribe the length of those periods of plenary part-sessions. It
is traditional for two periods of plenary part-sessions to be held in
Strasbourg in October to compensate for the lack of a plenary part-session in
August. In accordance with the Parliament’s practice, the periods of ordinary
plenary part-sessions, which last four days, are held in Strasbourg while the
additional periods of part-sessions are held in Brussels.
Following two amendments tabled by Mr Fox
MEP, the Parliament, by two votes adopted on March 9, 2011, amended the
calendar of periods of part-sessions for 2012 and 2013. Firstly, one of the two
periods of plenary part-sessions of four days to be held in October 2012 and
October 2013 in Strasbourg was cancelled. Secondly, the remaining period of
plenary part-sessions of October 2012 and October 2013 were split in two: two
separate periods of plenary part-sessions of two days were thus to be held
during the week of 22 to 25 October 2012 and two during the week of 21 to 24 October
2013 to be held in Strasbourg.
France brought an action before the Court of Justice seeking annulment of those two votes of the Parliament. Supported by Luxembourg, it submitted that those votes infringed the Treaties and the case-law of the Court. It alleged, inter alia, that the Parliament had broken the regularity of the rhythm of the periods of plenary part-sessions by scheduling additional part-sessions in Brussels when only 11 periods of plenary part-sessions were scheduled for Strasbourg.
The Court first of all referred to the judgment in Joined Cases 358/85 and 51/86 France v Parliament [1988]. The Court held that even though that judgment concerned the interpretation of the Edinburgh Decision, that decision had been incorporated without amendment into the protocols concerning the seats of the institutions. In addition, not only did the parties agree on the relevance of that judgment for the present cases, but they also relied on it to support their divergent points of view.
The Court held that the judgment in France v Parliament is based on considerations regarding the relationship between, on the one hand, the competence of the Member States to determine the Parliament’s seat and, on the other, the Parliament’s power to determine its own internal organisation.
The Court stated that in France v
Parliament it had concluded that the Edinburgh Decision must be interpreted as
defining the seat of the Parliament as the place where 12 ordinary plenary
part-sessions must take place on a regular basis, including those during which
the Parliament is to exercise the budgetary powers conferred upon it by the
Treaty. By the same token, the Court held that additional plenary part-sessions
cannot be scheduled for any other place of work unless the Parliament holds the
12 ordinary plenary part-sessions in Strasbourg, where it has its seat.
In addition, the Court held that, by so
defining the Parliament’s seat, the Member States have not encroached upon the
power of the Parliament to determine its own internal organisation. Whilst the
Parliament is authorised, under that power of internal organisation, to take
appropriate measures to ensure the proper functioning and conduct of its proceedings,
its decisions in that regard must respect the competence of the Member States
to determine the seat of the institutions.
The Court however held that the Member
States had the duty, in exercising their competence to determine the seat of
the institutions, to respect the Parliament’s power to determine its own
internal organisation and to ensure that such decisions did not stand in the
way of the proper functioning of that institution. The Court held that the constraints
imposed on the Parliament by the Edinburgh Decision were inherent in the need
to determine its seat while maintaining several places of work for the
institution, and did not conflict with the practice generally followed by the
Parliament.
Similarly, the Court now held that the
plenary part‑sessions as provided for in the contested
votes did not satisfy the requirements under the protocols concerning the seats
of the institutions.
The Court first of all pointed out that
draft calendar of plenary part‑sessions for October 2012
and 2013 differed clearly from that set out in the contested votes.
Secondly, it argued that it was clear from
the actual wording of the amendments which led to the contested votes that their
purpose was to ‘cancel’ the first period of plenary part‑sessions proposed for October 2012 and 2013 and ‘to split [the
second period] into two’. Thus, according to the wording of those amendments,
one of the two four‑day part‑sessions scheduled for October in the two years at issue had to be
cancelled, whereas the other part‑session, which was
split into two, was converted into two two‑day part‑sessions.
Thus, the two newly created plenary part‑sessions for 2012 did not correspond to the duration of a single
period of ordinary plenary part‑sessions as scheduled for
the other months of 2012. As a general rule, those part‑sessions started on Monday at 17.00 and end at 23.00, then continued
on Tuesday from 09.00 to 23.00, on Wednesday from 09.00 to 23.00 and on
Thursday from 09.00 to 17.00, when they ended.
The Court held that that distinction
presupposed that, for a part‑session to fall in the
category of ‘ordinary plenary part-session’, it must be equivalent to the other
ordinary monthly part-sessions scheduled in accordance with the protocols
concerning the seats of the institutions, in particular in terms of the actual
duration of the part‑sessions.
However, the part‑sessions in October 2012 and 2013 were not equivalent in terms of
duration to the other periods of ordinary monthly part‑sessions scheduled by the same votes.
Finally, as regards the Parliament’s
argument relating to its power to determine its own internal organisation, although
it was indisputable that the Parliament held such a power, in exercising that
power, respect the competence of the Member States to determine its seat, since
the protocols concerning the seats of the institutions were predicated on
mutual respect on the part of the Member States and the Parliament for each
other’s areas of competence.
The Court pointed out that, although that
increase was to a large extent attributable to the constant expansion of the
Parliament’s areas of competence, it did not explain how the work to be carried
out in a plenary part‑session would be any
less; nor does it explain the reasons why such an increase in the work carried
out by the committees would have repercussions specifically on the plenary part‑sessions to be held in October.
The Court found that reduction in the
duration of the first period of plenary part‑sessions to one and a half days, motivated by the consideration that
the budget session could from now on, in practice, be dealt with quickly, was
not consonant with the importance of the budget session.
The Court held that the exercise by the
Parliament of its budgetary powers in plenary sitting constituted a fundamental
event in the democratic life of the European Union and must therefore be
carried out with all the attention, rigour and commitment which such a
responsibility demanded. The exercise of that power required, inter alia, a
public debate in plenary sitting enabling the citizens of the European Union to
acquaint themselves with the various political orientations expressed and, as a
result, to form a political opinion on the European Union’s actions.
Lastly, the Court observed that, even if
the disadvantages and costs engendered by the plurality of the Parliament’s
places of work – as described by that institution in the context of these
proceedings – were acknowledged, it was not for the Parliament or for the Court
to remedy that situation: rather, it was for the Member States to do so, where
appropriate, in the exercise of their competence to determine the seats of the
institutions.
The Court concluded that the two plenary
part‑sessions scheduled by the contested votes for
October 2012 and October 2013 could not be regarded as two monthly plenary part‑sessions within the meaning of the protocols concerning the seats of
the institutions.
The contested votes must therefore be
annulled to the extent that they did not provide for 12 monthly plenary
part-sessions to be held in Strasbourg in 2012 and 2013.
