Article 41 - Right to good administration
Article 48 - Presumption of innocence and right of defence
Key facts of the case:
Appeal – Competition – Agreements, decisions and concerted practices – Truck market – Decision finding an infringement of Article 101 TFEU and of Article 53 of the Agreement on the European Economic Area (EEA) – Agreements and concerted practices in relation to the prices of trucks, the timing for the introduction of emission technologies required by Euro 3 to Euro 6 standards and the passing on of the costs of those technologies to customers – Single and continuous infringement – Geographic scope of that infringement – ‘Hybrid procedure’ leading successively to the adoption of a settlement decision and a decision at the end of a standard procedure – Article 41 of the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union – Right to good administration – Impartiality of the European Commission – Assessment of the geographic scope of a concerted practice – Relevant evidence – Classification of a series of acts as a ‘single and continuous infringement’ – Regulation (EC) No 1/2003 – Article 25 – Power of the Commission to impose a fine – Limitation.
Outcome of the case:
On those grounds, the Court (Tenth Chamber) hereby:
1. Dismisses the appeal;
2. Orders Scania AB, Scania CV AB and Scania Deutschland GmbH to bear their own costs and to pay those incurred by the European Commission.
62 In support of their appeal, the appellants put forward four grounds of appeal. The first ground of appeal alleges, in essence, infringement of the right to good administration enshrined in Article 41(1) of the Charter. The second ground of appeal alleges infringement of Article 101 TFEU and Article 53 of the EEA Agreement on the ground that the General Court classified the geographic scope of the conduct at the German level meetings as extending to the entire territory of the EEA. By their third ground of appeal, the appellants essentially claim that the General Court infringed the latter two articles, on the ground that it classified as a single infringement the series of acts comprising three different levels of contacts. The fourth ground of appeal alleges infringement of the same articles and of Article 25 of Regulation No 1/2003 on the ground that the General Court upheld a fine in respect of conduct that was time-barred.
63 By their first ground of appeal, the appellants submit that the General Court erred in law by rejecting their argument that, by adopting the settlement decision and continuing its investigation against the appellants without entrusting that investigation to a team other than the one which had been responsible for the file which gave rise to that decision, the Commission infringed Article 41(1) of the Charter.
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67 According to the appellants, such an acknowledgement casts doubt on the Commission’s impartiality. In paragraph 151 of the judgment under appeal, the General Court also indicates how the Commission could have acted to remove such doubt, namely by ‘allocating the file to two different teams’, that is to say, by involving in the standard procedure which led to the adoption of the decision at issue a team other than the one involved in the settlement procedure. Thus, it follows from the General Court’s own reasoning in that judgment that, by adopting the settlement decision and continuing its investigation against Scania by relying on the same Commission services, the Commission infringed Article 41(1) of the Charter. The appellants submit that the General Court, however, failed to acknowledge that the Commission had not offered guarantees sufficient to rule out any legitimate doubt as to its objective impartiality in the conduct of that standard procedure, thereby committing an error of law.
70 The right to good administration, enshrined in Article 41 of the Charter, provides that every person has the right, inter alia, to have his or her affairs handled impartially by the institutions of the European Union. That requirement of impartiality encompasses, on the one hand, subjective impartiality, in so far as no member of the institution concerned who is responsible for the matter may show bias or personal prejudice, and, on the other hand, objective impartiality, in so far as there must be sufficient guarantees to exclude any legitimate doubt as to bias on the part of the institution concerned (judgment of 12 January 2023, HSBC Holdings and Others v Commission, C‑883/19 P, EU:C:2023:11, paragraph 77 and the case-law cited).
