Legal Developments
| DOI | 10.1177/1023263X1302000107 |
| Date | 01 March 2013 |
| Published date | 01 March 2013 |
| Subject Matter | Legal Developments |
20 MJ 1 (2013) 127
LEGAL DEVELOPMENTS
Amending the Statute of the EU C ourts
Arjen Meij*
§1. IN TRODUCT ION
Last summer, some amendments to the Stat ute of the EU Court of Justice made their way,
relatively unnoticed, into the O cial Journal.1 e adopted amendments are concerned
with all three branches of the institution. However, the most substantial among the
proposals submitted to the legislative authorities, an enla rgement of the General Court
with 12 additional judges, ha s not so far been agreed on.2
e courts which are united in the EU’s judicial institution, in par ticular the Court
of Justice and the General Court, nd themselves in a somewhat paradoxica l situation.
ei r composition represents as many legal traditions and cultures a s there are Member
States, and their operation in only a slightly lower number of languages of procedure,
with French as an internal working language, counts for an unprecedented, time and
energy consuming e ort to achieve an administration of justice of some coherence. It
is no surprise therefore that their production in terms of numbers of judgments and
decisions does not compare with any nationa l court system. On the contrar y, it is a sheer
miracle that the se courts succeed in producing several hu ndreds of reasonably coherent
decisions each year.
However, it is to be noted, paradoxically, that statistics in recent annual reports
continue to show increases in the numbers of i ncoming cases. At present this is main ly a
result of subsequent accessions, and of new areas of l itigation owing from the Treaty of
Lisbon. A growing number of prelim inary references from the court s of the new Member
States of 2004 and 20 07, as wel l as in the areas of civil and cr iminal judicial cooperation
make up for a gradual shi in the number of preliminary references from a lmost half to
* Former Judge in the Gener al Court; Visiting Professor University of Luxemb ourg and Honorar y
Professor at the Universit y of Utrecht; Visiting Re search Fellow at the TMC Asse r Institute.
1 Regulation (EU/Euratom) No 741/2012 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 11August
2012 amending the P rotocol on the Statute of the Cou rt of Justice of the Europ ean Union and Annex 1
thereto, [2012] OJ L 228/1.
2 See also A.W.H. Meij, ‘Court s in transit ion: Admini stration of Just ice and how to organi ze it’, 50
CMLRev. 1 (2013), p.1–12, on which the present note s are largely based.
Legal Developments
128 20 MJ 1 (2013)
two-thirds of t he total number of cases before the Court of Justice .3 At the same time, in
the General Cour t, relatively new areas of litigation, such as cou nter-terrorism measures,
market authorizations, and access to documents, continue to give rise to growth of the
case load, and its core busines s – heavy groups and single ca ses in the areas of competit ion,
state aid and anti-dumping – does not show any sign of dec reasing.
§2. THE COURT OF JUSTICE
Interestingly, as a result of simplifying procedures and rigorous case management,
the Court of Justice has succeeded over the past years in cutting back the length of
proceedi ngs in ordinar y prelimina ry references to roug hly 16 months on average, which
is quite a performance considering the duration of well over 20 months not so many
years ago. Also, the Cou rt has successfully intro duced an urgent preliminary procedure,
in particu lar for cases where a party in t he main proceedings would be in custody.4 is
may explain why the proposed changes for the Court itself have remained limited to
internal organizational measures, such as the introduction of a Vice-President and an
adaptation of the con guration of the Grand Chamber.
According to the provisions of the new Ar ticle9a of the Statute, the Vice-President,
equally elected for th ree years, shall assist t he President in accordance with the condit ions
laid down in the Rules of Procedure and take his place when t he President is prevented
or the o ce is vacant. Following Article10 of the new Rules of Procedure, the Vice-
President takes the President’s place, at his request, in matters of representation and in
his responsibilities to ensure t he proper functioni ng of the services of the Court. As fa r
as the President’s judicial duties are concerned, a sepa rate decision of the Court speci es
that the Vice-President takes over the President’s duties in proceed ings for interim relief.5
e rst Vice-President, Judge Koen Lenaerts, was elected on 9 October 2012 following
the tri-annua l partial renewal of the Cour t.
A new statutory provision purports to enlarge the Grand Chamber of the Court
from 13 to 15 judges.6 e Grand Chamber deals grosso modo with 30% of the more
important cases concerning issues of principle. It is composed of the President and the
Vice-President as well as three of t he Presidents of the chambers of ve judges fol lowing
a xed rotation scheme; to this core are added 10 more judges, also on the basis of a
rotation scheme. is c omplex sched ule a llows for mor e judg es th an be fore to part icip ate
in the work of the Grand Chamber. However, this also g ives rise to a greater caseload for
3 In 2011, there were 423 prelimi nary references on 688 in coming cases.
4 Articles107 to 109 of the new Rules of P rocedure, [2012] OJ L 265/1, implementing the new A rticle267(4)
TFEU.
5 Decis ion of th e Cour t of 23Oc tober 2012 concer ning t he judic ial fu nctio ns of the Vice-Pr esident o f the
Court, [2012] OJ L 300/47.
6 Article16 (2) (new) of the Statute.
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