Official Journal of the European Union

C 348/23

(Case T-519/20)

(2020/C 348/33)

Language of the case: Dutch

Parties

Applicant: LP (represented by: J. Bosquet and G. Op de Beeck, lawyers)

Defendant: European Parliament

Form of order sought

—annul the decision of 22 October 2019 of the authority empowered to conclude contracts of employment refusing the recruitment of the applicant as an accredited parliamentary assistant to the European Parliament (the first contested decision);

—annul the decision of the Secretary-General of the European Parliament of 14 May 2020 rejecting the complaint brought by the applicant under Article 90(2) of the Staff Regulations against the first contested decision (the second contested decision);

—order the defendant to pay the costs.

Pleas in law and main arguments

In support of the action, the applicant relies on a single plea in law.

Single plea in law: infringement of Article 128(2)(c) of the Conditions of Employment of Other Servants of the European Union and Article 41(1) and (2) of the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union.

—Infringement of Article 128(2)(c) of the Conditions of Employment of Other Servants of the European Union in that the European Parliament wrongly interprets that article as requiring the possession of a clean criminal record. However, that article relates to job-related safeguards, whereby an entry in the excerpt from the criminal record is relevant only if it is of such a kind as to impair a job-related function or if it is of such a kind as to have an impact on the exercise of the function in practice. The grounds of the contested decisions are contrary to the abovementioned article since, in the second contested decision, the defendant confirms that there is no current, genuine and sufficiently serious threat to the proper performance of the duties, given that there are merely ‘doubts’ relating to the applicant's moral integrity.

—Infringement of Article 41(1) and (2) of the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union and of the principle of due care which emerges therefrom, since the European Parliament did not take into account all the relevant factors in its assessment when recruiting the applicant. No account was taken of the relationship of trust with the Member of the European Parliament concerned or of the fact that the applicant is already a parliamentary assistant in the parliament of one of the federated states of Belgium. Moreover, the European Parliament disregards the recognition of guilt made by the applicant in his complaint by judging that he lacks a sense of responsibility in that he qualifies the offence entered in the extract from the criminal record. The contested decisions are therefore inadequately reasoned.