State aid: Commission streamlines handling of state aid complaints
11 Apr 2014 10:19 AM
The
European Commission has introduced a new mandatory complaint form that will
enable complainants to provide the Commission with the core elements
necessary to investigate possible illegal aid in a single submission. This will
make it easier for complainants to identify which information the Commission
needs for its investigation and enable the Commission to act faster on
suspected violations of the state aid rules. With the adoption of the form, the
last building block of the reform of state aid procedures has been put in
place. The streamlining of procedures is one of the key objectives of the
Commission's State Aid Modernisation (SAM) agenda (see IP/12/458).
Joaquín Almunia, Commission Vice President in
charge of competition policy, said: "Today we completed
the most comprehensive reform of state aid procedures in the last 15 years.
From now on, we will be able to more swiftly and efficiently investigate
complaints that point to distortions threatening the integrity of the Single
Market. This procedural reform, together with the ongoing substantive
reform of state aid rules, will ensure a more effective state aid control by
the Commission."
Complaints are a very useful source of information.
However the Commission also receives many complaints that are not motivated by
genuine competition concerns, are unsubstantiated or cannot be addressed
through state aid rules. Given the Commission's duty to investigate all
complaints, this can lead to a waste of the Commission's limited resources.
Thus, in order to address this shortcoming, from now on information submitted
to the Commission by third parties must fulfil two criteria before it can be
registered as a formal complaint.
-
First, it must be submitted by
an interested party, as defined by the state aid
Procedural Regulation as amended in July 2013 (see IP/13/728) and the EU Courts. On this basis, only
Member States and any person, undertaking, or association of undertakings whose
interests might be affected by alleged illegal aid may submit a complaint to
the Commission.
-
Second, such information must be submitted in a complete
and structured manner, using the compulsory complaint
form. The form is available at: http://ec.europa.eu/competition/forms/download_en.html<
/p>
Background
In
July 2013, the EU's Council of Ministers adopted, on the basis of a
proposal by the Commission, a reform of the State aid Procedural
Regulation (see IP/13/728 and MEMO/12/942). This was the first substantial overhaul of the
Procedural Regulation, which dates back to 1999 and sets out the rules of
procedure governing the enforcement of Articles 107 and 108 of the Treaty on
the Functioning of the European Union (TFEU). One of the main elements of the
2013 reform was the streamlining of the handling of complaints,
byclarifying the requirements to lodge a complaint and setting up a more
transparent and faster procedure. This weeks adoption of the mandatory
complaint form was the last step to allow this reform to deploy all its
effects.
The
European state aid rules are part of the founding Treaties establishing the
European Economic Community and the European Coal and Steel Community in 1957
and are currently enshrined in the TFEU.
Article 107 of the TFEU contains the definition of state
aid and the grounds on which aid may be found compatible with the internal
market, while Article 108 sets out the main principles governing the
Commission's action to ensure compliance with the state aid
rules.
The
reform of procedures is one of the building blocks of the State Aid
Modernisation (SAM) initiative launched on 8 May 2012 (see IP/12/458). The improvement of complaints handling was one of
the two main objectives, as announced in the SAM Communication.