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The Selection of Judges and Advocate-General at the Court of Justice of the European Union: The Role of the Panel Established Under Art. 255 TFEU

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Abstract

Before the adoption of the Lisbon Treaty, the selection of judges and Advocate-General at the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) was entirely dominated by governments of the Member State. Hence, art. 255 TFEU established a new judicial selection panel responsible for giving an opinion on prospective candidates’ suitability to perform the duties concerned, with the aim to make the judicial appointment more transparent. Ten years after the establishment of the Panel 255 is, therefore, possible to make a first assessment on how this body improved the transparency of the mechanism to select Judges and Advocate-General. In that regard, the paper shows that, on the one hand, the Panel has contributed to make the selection process more objective, but, on the other, it lacks in transparency.

Francesco Battaglia is Researcher of European Union Law at the University Sapienza of Rome.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    ECJ, Case 294/83, Parti écologiste “Les Verts” v European Parliament, 23 April 1986, ECLI:EU:C:1986:166.

  2. 2.

    On the principle of rule of law in the European Union, see Magen and Pech (2018), pp. 235–256.

  3. 3.

    ECJ (Grand Chamber), Case C-64/16, Associação Sindical dos Juízes Portugueses v Tribunal de Contas, 27 February 2018, ECLI:EU:C:2018:117, point 36.

  4. 4.

    ECtHR, appl. n. 11179/84, Langborger v. Sweden, 22 June 1989, par. 32; appl. n. 7819/77; 7878/77, Campbell and Fell v. The United Kingdom, 28 June 1984, par. 78.

  5. 5.

    European Commission for Democracy Through Law, Report on the Independence of the Judicial System – Part I: The Independence of Judges, 16 March 2010, CDL-AD(2010)004.

  6. 6.

    Kenney (1998), pp. 101–133; Solanke (2009), pp. 89–121.

  7. 7.

    Treaty Establishing the European Community, art. 167, in OJ, C 191, 29 July 1992, 1–112.

  8. 8.

    Treaty Establishing the European Community, art. 223, in OJ, C 340, 10 November 1997, 1–308.

  9. 9.

    Treaty Establishing the European Community, art. 223, in OJ, C 325, 24 December 2002, 33–184.

  10. 10.

    The European Convention, Final Report of the Discussion Circle on the Court of Justice, CONV 636/03, 25 March 2003. Available on line at http://www.europarl.europa.eu/meetdocs_all/committees/conv/20030403/03c_en.pdf. Last time visited on 18 December 2018.

  11. 11.

    On the mechanisms established by the Commonwealth states, see van Zyl Smit (2015), pp. 1–56.

  12. 12.

    Treaty Establishing a Constitution for Europe, Article I-29, in OJ, C 310, 16 December 2004, 1–474.

  13. 13.

    The Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union, art. 255, in OJ, C 83, 30 March 2010, 1–403.

  14. 14.

    On the establishment of the Panel, see Sauvé (2015), pp. 78–85; Alemanno (2015), pp. 202–221; Dumbrovský (2014), pp. 455–482.

  15. 15.

    Council of Europe, Committee of Ministers, Resolution (2010)26 on the establishment of an Advisory Panel of Experts on Candidates for Election as Judge to the European Court of Human Rights, 10 November 2010.

  16. 16.

    See Lemmens (2015), pp. 95–119.

  17. 17.

    See Bobek (2015), p. 284.

  18. 18.

    Steering Committee for Human Rights, Report on the review of the functioning of the Advisory Panel of experts on candidates for election as judge to the European Court of Human Rights Strasbourg, 29 November 2013, CDDH(2013)R79 Addendum II.

  19. 19.

    Council of Europe, Committee of Ministers, Resolution (2014)44, amending Resolution CM/Res(2010)26 on the establishment of an Advisory Panel of Experts on Candidates for Election as Judge to the European Court of Human Rights, 26 November 2014.

  20. 20.

    Steering Committee for Human Rights, Committee of Experts on the System of the European Convention on Human Rights, Report on the process of selection and election of judges of the European Court of Human Rights, CDDH(2017)R88addI, 11 December 2017.

  21. 21.

    Advisory Panel of Experts on Candidates for Election as Judge to the European Court of Human Rights, Third activity report for the attention of the Committee of Ministers, Advisory Panel (2017)2, 30 June 2017.

  22. 22.

    Council Decision of 25 February 2010 relating to the operating rules of the panel provided for in Article 255 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union, in OJ, L 50, 27 February 2010, 18–19.

  23. 23.

    Council Decision (EU, Euratom) 2017/2262 of 4 December 2017 appointing the members of the panel provided for in Article 255 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union, in OJ L 324, 8 December 2017, 50.

  24. 24.

    The private hearing takes place only with candidate for a first term of office as Judge or Advocate general. Instead, with regard to the document requested, the Panel calls members States to send (a) the essential reasons which led the government to propose the candidate; (b) information on the national procedure that led to the candidate being selected, if there was one; (c) a letter from the candidate explaining the reasons for the application; (d) a CV in the harmonised format defined by the panel at its meeting on 25 April 2014; (e) the text of one to three recent publications, of which the candidate is the author, written in or translated into English or French; (f) the presentation of one to three delicate legal cases which the candidate has handled in their professional practice, which must not exceed five pages per case. See, Fifth Activity Report of the panel provided for by Article 255 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union, 28 February 2018, 19.

  25. 25.

    At the request of the Presidency, the President of the Panel shall present that opinion even to the Representatives of the Governments of the Member States’ meeting within the Council.

  26. 26.

    Fifth Activity Report, 23–24.

  27. 27.

    Regulation (EC) No 1049/2001 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 30 May 2001 regarding public access to European Parliament, Council and Commission documents, in OJ, L 145, 31 May 2001, 43–48, art. 4 “2. The institutions shall refuse access to a document where disclosure would undermine the protection of commercial interests of a natural or legal person, including intellectual property, court proceedings and legal advice, the purpose of inspections, investigations and audits, unless there is an overriding public interest in disclosure. 3. Access to a document, drawn up by an institution for internal use or received by an institution, which relates to a matter where the decision has not been taken by the institution, shall be refused if disclosure of the document would seriously undermine the institution’s decision-making process, unless there is an overriding public interest in disclosure”. On the exceptions provided by art. 4 of the regulation 1049/2001, see, inter alia, Maes (2014), pp. 475–497; Harden (2009), pp. 239–256; Maes (2008), pp. 577–590; Heliskoski and Leino (2006), pp. 735–781.

  28. 28.

    On the principle of transparency, see Alemanno (2015), pp. 202–221; Österdahl (2016), pp. 61–79.

  29. 29.

    Fifth Activity Report of the Panel Provided for by Article 255 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union, 28 February 2018. Available at https://curia.europa.eu/jcms/upload/docs/application/pdf/2018-05/5eme_rapport_dactivite_du_c255_-_en_final_-_public.pdf. Last time visited on 10 February 2018.

  30. 30.

    European Ombudsman, Refusal of the Council to publish opinions regarding nominations for the Court of Justice and the General Court, case 1011/2015/TN, opened on 14 July 2015.

  31. 31.

    For a detailed description of the complaint, see Alemanno A, Lapp C, Delalande A, Khadar L (2015) The EU Public Interest Clinic and Access Info Europe Present: A Complaint to the European Ombudsman Regarding Judicial Transparency. Available at https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2636877. Last time visited on 10 February 2018.

  32. 32.

    On the exceptions provided by art. 4 of the regulation 1049/2001, Supra note 26.

  33. 33.

    European Ombudsman, Decision in case 1011/2015/TN concerning the refusal of the Council of the European Union to give access to opinions on candidates’ suitability to perform the duties of Judge and Advocate-General at the Court of Justice and the General Court of the EU, 4 May 2016.

  34. 34.

    See, Erikson A, Li M, Shalaby O, Transparent Selection of Judges for EU Courts. Complaint to the European Ombudsman, 2017. Available on line at https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3072588. Last time visited on 10 February 2019.

  35. 35.

    European Ombudsman, The Council of the European Union’s handling of requests for access to documents prepared by the Article 255 Panel on Judicial Appointments to the Court of Justice and the General Court of the EU, case 1955/2017/THH, opened on 13 November 2017.

  36. 36.

    In that sense, see also the position expressed the European Court of Human rights in the case Hannover v. Germany (application n. 59320/00), issued on 24 September 2004, and in particular par. 63, where the Court stated that “a fundamental distinction needs to be made between reporting facts – even controversial ones – capable of contributing to a debate in a democratic society relating to politicians in the exercise of their functions, for example, and reporting details of the private life of an individual who, moreover, as in this case, does not exercise official functions. While in the former case the press exercises its vital role of “watchdog” in a democracy by contributing to impart[ing] information and ideas on matters of public interest, it does not do so in the latter case”.

  37. 37.

    Judgment of the General Court (Fifth Chamber), Case T-115/13, Gert-Jan Dennekamp v. European Parliament, 15 July 2015, ECLI:EU:T:2015:497, point 119.

  38. 38.

    Judgment of the Court (Grand Chamber) of 1 July 2008, Joined cases C-39/05 P and C-52/05 P, Kingdom of Sweden and Maurizio Turco v Council of the European Union, ECLI:EU:C:2008:374; Judgment of the Court (First Chamber) of 21 July 2011, Case C-506/08 P, Kingdom of Sweden v European Commission and MyTravel Group plc, ECLI:EU:C:2011:496; Judgment of the General Court (Seventh Chamber, Extended Composition) of 22 March 2018, Case T-540/15, Emilio De Capitani v European Parliament, ECLI:EU:T:2018:167.

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  1. Sapienza University of Rome, Rome, Italy

    Francesco Battaglia

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    Paulo Pinto de Albuquerque  & Krzysztof Wojtyczek  & 

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Battaglia, F. (2019). The Selection of Judges and Advocate-General at the Court of Justice of the European Union: The Role of the Panel Established Under Art. 255 TFEU. In: Pinto de Albuquerque, P., Wojtyczek, K. (eds) Judicial Power in a Globalized World. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-20744-1_2

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