14.8.2023

EN

Official Journal of the European Union

C 286/31

(Case T-319/23)

(2023/C 286/42)

Language of the case: English

Parties

Applicant: Net Technologies Finland Oy (Helsinki, Finland) (represented by: S. Pappas and A. Pappas, lawyers)

Defendant: European Commission

Form of order sought

The applicant claims that the Court should:

—annul the decision of the European Commission adopted on the basis of Article 299 TFEU on 27.03.2023 (and notified to the applicant on 29.03.2023) concerning the recovery of EUR 188 477,27 from Net Technologies Finland Oy; and,

—order the defendant to bear its costs as well as the applicant’s costs for the current proceedings.

Pleas in law and main arguments

With the present application for annulment, it is argued that the contested decision is illegal because its motivation is unlawful. And its motivation is unlawful because it is based on the debit notes of 7 May 2020 and the findings of the final audit report which are unlawful. To that end, two pleas of annulment are put forward.

The first plea of annulment is divided in two parts:

—in the first part it is explained that the final audit findings and, by extension, the debit notes are unlawful because they are the result of the application of a rule that was not legally binding, and thus, inapplicable. As explained in the factual background, the REA auditors reached the conclusion that the costs of the in-house consultants were ineligible by applying the criteria of the FP7 Guide as if they were binding conditions. Nonetheless, the FP7 guide is non-binding.

—in the second part it is argued that, in the present case, the principle of good faith cannot justify the applicability of the FP7 Guide in spite of its non-binding nature.

2.In the context of the second plea of annulment it is argued that, assuming that the criteria of the FP7 Guide were applicable, they were applied incorrectly. In other words, the findings of the final audit report and the debit notes adopted on its basis are vitiated by errors of assessment. By relying on those elements, the contested decision is also vitiated by the same errors of assessment and infringes the obligation, enshrined in Article 41 of the Charter of fundamental rights, to examine carefully all elements of the case.