MEPs agreed with changes to Protocol 3 of the Statute of the Court of Justice which aims to ensure more efficiency in the judicial proceedings.
MEPs approved Statute changes unanimously with 17 votes in favour. Proposed reform concerns two areas – transfer of requests for preliminary rulings from the Court to the General Court and extension of the appeal mechanism.
Better division of labour
The first part of the review aims to improve efficiency of judicial proceedings by transferring jurisdiction over requests for preliminary rulings in specific areas such as common VAT system, excise duties, greenhouse gas emission allowance trading or compensation for passengers to the General Court. This would improve the workload of the Court, since such requests represent on average 20% of all requests. At the same it, it would ensure that the Court will have more time to consider the most sensitive and complex cases. Second part of the reform aims to extend the appeal mechanism to include cases considered twice – once by an independent body and second time by the General Court and disputes related to the performance of contracts with arbitration clause.
More communication with the Parliament
MEPs want to make sure that in case the preliminary ruling concerns several areas or wider questions of primary law, it will be considered by the Court and not by the General Court. They believe that the Court should publish and update document containing examples of application of the new division of labour to ensure legal certainty and that any EU citizen should have access to court documents upon request. MEPs also ensured that European Parliament can submit statements to the Court of Justice irrespective of whether an act it has adopted is at stake and that a structured dialogue is established between the Parliament and the Court at least once a year to discuss improvements to the judicial system of the EU. MEPs are also asking the Court to prepare a report assessing the reform after three years, to clarify whether the defined objectives were met and they want all further changes to the Statute protocol be subject to two-month long public consultation.
Next steps
European parliament together with member states will now start negotiations about the final text of the legislation.
Source – EU Parliament