Orders (Information) nº T-259/15 of Tribunal General de la Unión Europea, June 15, 2015

• Resolution Date: June 15, 2015
• Issuing Organization: Tribunal General de la Unión Europea
• Decision Number: T-259/15

Case T-259/15 R

(publication by extracts)

SA Close and Cegelec

v

European Parliament

(Interim measures - Public works contracts - Tendering procedure - Construction of an energy unit - Rejection of tender submitted by a tenderer and award of the contract to another tenderer - Application for suspension of the operation of a measure - Lack of urgency)

Summary - Order of the President of the General Court, 15 June 2015

Application for interim measures - Suspension of operation of a measure - Conditions for granting - Urgency - Assessment in public procurement litigation - Serious damage - Sufficient where particularly strong prima facie case constituted by manifest and serious illegality - Condition - Application for interim measures brought in the standstill period before conclusion of the contract with the successful tenderer

(Art. 278 TFEU; Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union, Art. 47; Commission Regulation No 1268/2012, Art. 171(1))

In the context of an application for interim measures concerning a public law contract, the condition of demonstrating the likelihood of ‘irreparable’ harm can, as a general rule, be satisfied by an unsuccessful tenderer only with extreme difficulty. An unsuccessful tenderer cannot be required to establish that rejecting its application for interim measures would be likely to cause it irreparable harm, provided that the tenderer demonstrates that it has a particularly strong prima facie case, lest the tenderer’s right to an effective judicial remedy under Article 47 of the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union be excessively endangered without justification.

However, that relaxing of the relevant rules for assessing the condition of urgency, founded on the right to an effective judicial remedy, cannot be applied without restriction, given that the interests of the unsuccessful tenderer must be balanced with those of the contracting authority and of the successful tenderer. It follows that the relaxing of those rules applies only during the pre-contractual stage on condition that the standstill period laid down in Article 171(1) of Regulation No 1268/2012 has been respected, which, according to the circumstances, amounts to 10 or 14 calendar days. Where the contracting authority has concluded the contract with the...