European Competition Law provides a wide-ranging review of the European rules relating to competition: restrictive agreements, abuse of a dominant position, impact of intellectual property rights, procedure, merger control, State aid.

European Competition Law

An action for damages is liable to be brought against the beneficiary, the State granting the aid or the Union.
The mechanism for reviewing State aid does not impose any obligation on the recipient of aid. Furthermore, only the State granting the aid is the addressee of the final decision of the Commission. Therefore, the recipient's liability does not fall within EU law . By contrast, such a liab …

Admissibility

An action for damages is liable to be brought against the beneficiary, the State granting the aid or the Union.

The mechanism for reviewing State aid does not impose any obligation on the recipient of aid. Furthermore, only the State granting the aid is the addressee of the final decision of the Commission. Therefore, the recipient's liability does not fall within EU law . By contrast, such a liability could be sought on the basis of the relevant national law . 

The recipient of illegal aid or one of its competitors should be entitled to incur the liability of the State granting the aid before the national court , for breach of EU law.

Article 340 TFEU organizes an EU non-contractual liability scheme in accordance with the general principles common to the laws of the Member States. Three conditions must be fulfilled to incur the EU's liability: an unlawful conduct of the institution, actual damage and a causal link between the damage and the conduct . Regarding State aid, the alleged material damage is the logic consequence of the compatibility decision . It cannot be taken into consideration insofar as it took place before the notification of the recovery decision, even if the latter was subsequently annulled . Furthermore, the expiry of a limitation period  which merely seeks to limit in time the powers of the Commission concerning recovery of State aid cannot preclude liability being incurred by the State before the national court for infringement of the obligation of prior notification . Lastly, the existence of a causal link between the damage and the decision to recover the aid is excluded where the cessation of payment of the beneficiary undertaking took place before the notification of the recovery decision . In effect, the conduct complained of against the EU institutions must be the decisive cause of the harm, which must result in a sufficiently direct manner from the unlawful conduct, excluding, in particular, damage which is merely a remote consequence of that conduct . Furthermore, the harm alleged must be of a continuing nature. This is the case when the alleged material harm was not caused instantaneously, but continued over a period of time and was renewed in successive periods, so that its amount increased in proportion to the time elapsed due to the persistence of the effects of an unlawful act, or when the harm constitites damage to reputation, which, by its very nature, is of a continuous nature when the alleged harm to reputation was not implemented instantaneously, but was renewed daily throughout the period during which the operative event persisted .

Case C-39/94 SFEI and others [1996] ECR I-3547, LawLex200500005133JBJ: in this case, the liability was sought on the basis of the recipient's negligence as it had not verified whether the aid had previously been declared compatible.

For an unsuccessful application, French case: Cass. com. No 97-15.684 of 15 June 1999: the applicant alleged that its competitor could offer a lower bid for a public contract thanks to aid.

Case C-24/95 Land Rheinland-Pfalz v Alcan Deutschland [1997] ECR I-1591, LawLex200500005094JBJ; Case C-368/04 Transalpine Ölleitung in Österreich [2006] ECR I-9957, LawLex200700001470JBJ.

Established case-law, see, inter alia, Case T-230/95 BAI v Commission [1999] ECR II-123, LawLex200500005248JBJ.

Case T-230/95 BAI v Commission [1999] ECR II-123, LawLex200500005248JBJ.

Case T-304/04 Italy v Commission [2006] ECR II-64.

Case C-387/17 Presidenza del Consiglio dei Ministri, Judgment of  23 January 2013, LawLex201900000098JBJ.

Case T-344/04 Bouychou v Commission [2007] ECR II-91.

Case T-415/21 Banca Popolare di Bari SpA, Judgmentof 20 December 2023, LawLex202500006919JBJ.

European Competition Law

453. Admissibility

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Les décisions de justice citées dans ce paragraphe :

Les notions juridiques connexes

453. Admissibility

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Les décisions de justice citées dans ce paragraphe :

Les notions juridiques connexes

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