Vivien Terrien – legal secretary, CJEU – General Court
Mariya Serafimova – lawyer, CJEU – Court of Justice
George Gryllos – référendaire, CJEU – Court of Justice
This panel examines the legal mechanics of CJEU adjudication. It consists of three remarkable experts in EU Law Mariya Serafimova, Vivien Terrien and George Gryllos. Not only all three work at the Court of Justice of the European Union, are very knowledgeable and understand a host of intrinsic technicalities of the functioning of the Institution – they are also very amicable and approachable story-tellers. The discussion planned for 60 minutes lasted over 100 – and we could go on and on. Obviously, we tried to keep the focus of our conversation within the realm of competition law – but many great points by all three speakers would be of interests to colleagues specialising in EU Law as well as in Constitutional Law.
The topics which have been addressed include (but are not limited by) the following:
– the level of judicial scrutiny of Commission’s decisions in competition law & the DMA
– the role of Legal Secretary
– evolution of judicial review of competition cases at the CJEU
– the right of the defence
– sophistication of competition law
– increased role of economic evidence
– Commission’s discretion
– Court’s discretion
– the key features of the administrative system & active role of the parties (in law & in fact)
– do the expert sense an emerging appetite in the CJEU in getting more competences?
– reform of preliminary ruling procedure
– history & evolution of preliminary ruling procedure
– interpretation of law: how far the Court can go
– relationship between the General Court, Advocates Generate & the Court of Justice
– the role of subjective factors and judges’ personality in adjudication process
– should the Court be mindful of the broader socio-economic, political context?
– how often do lawyers draft preliminary ruling requests for national judges and is it a problem?
– the role of French in the proceedings & administration
– institutional reforms
– how many competition cases are being adjudicated upon by the CJEU in different historical periods (variation from as many as 80 per year to as few as 8)
– how much time each competition case gets from the CJEU in different historical periods
– why impact assessments for new legislation should also include analysis of the implications for the administrability of potential cases in the CJEU
– the recipe for doing the job well but fast
– will the DMA & DSA become a lawyers’ paradise?
– the more economic approach and the length of the procedures
– the role of economics and the role of the broader vision in the DMA
– interaction of data protection and competition laws
– interaction of economics with established legal principles and the impact on legal certainty
– which aspects of the DMA are most likely to be challenged in the Court
– is there a judicial continuity/correlation between ex-post competition law & the DMA?
– actions for annulment of the Commission’s non-compliance decisions
– actions for annulment of the refusals by the Commission to further specify obligations of Art 6 & 7 DMA
– actions for annulment of specification decisions by the Commission
– the principle of equal treatment and the first DSA cases: a new big thing?
– the history of the principle of equal treatment in the CJEU jurisprudence
– efficiency defence in the DMA: explicit and implicit
– what judges read beyond cases and legislation, the role of subjective factors
– DMA & national digital competition law
– non bis in idem
– fairness & contestability as established principles of ex-post competition law
– DMA & collective redress
– and more & more
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The Digital Markets Research Hub is an independent academic initiative aiming at scrutinising the functioning of competition/regulation in digital markets. We host one-to-one interviews with leading policymakers, regulators and practitioners. We also organise online mini-workshops inviting high-profile experts and academics in various fields of digital competition law & policy to discuss the most vibrant issues of the ongoing regulatory reforms in digital markets.
While having our clear normative stand on the matters discussed within the hub, we value different views and invite relevant stakeholders and thinkers representing the whole spectrum of reasonable positions on how to regulate competition in digital markets.
All our materials are available at YouTube channel, which you are very welcome to subscribe to.
Interview is organised & conducted by Prof. Oles Andriychuk, Newcastle Law School, UK
