Opinion of Mr Advocate General Mancini

Mr President,

Members of the Court,

1. The application of 11 September 1984 which commenced these proceedings is composed of a series of claims brought against the Commission by Angelo Valentini, an employee of that institution, seeking the annulment of three decisions concerning grading on establishment. For present purposes, however, the Court must limit itself to deciding whether the defendant's objection that the action is inadmissible is well founded; it is therefore with that problem that I shall deal in this opinion.

2. In support of its objection the Commission contends that the action was brought out of time. The official should — it claims — have contested the decisions assigning him to Grades L/A 8 and A 7, which go back to 1975 and 1978 respectively, within the periods laid down in the Staff Regulations; he cannot revive his right to challenge them, once it has lapsed, by pleading the memorandum of 21 October 1983, under which Exceptionally, any official graded under the ... decision [of 6 June 1973] who feels that he has not been graded according to the criteria laid down by it has a final opportunity to apply for regrading within three months of the date of this publication.

3. As the Court is aware, it has jurisdiction under Article 91 of the Staff Regulations to settle any dispute between the Communities and their officials regarding the legality of an act adversely affecting such persons. An action may lie provided that the appointing authority has previously had a complaint submitted to it and that the complaint has been rejected by an express or implied decision. For the lodging of an application the permitted period is three months, commencing either from the date of notification of the decision taken in response to the complaint, or, where the action is brought against an implied decision rejecting such a complaint, from the expiry of the period prescribed for the reply. The case-law of the Court on the subject of time-limits is quite consistent. They have been held to be mandatory; their purpose is to ensure legal certainty and neither the parties nor the Court — which is obliged to enforce them of its own motion — may waive them (see judgments of 12 December 1967, Case 4/67, Muller (née Collignon), [1967] ECR 365; 7 July 1971, Case 79/70 Müllers, [1971] ECR 689; 5 June 1980, Case 108/79, Belfiore, [1980] ECR 1769; and 19 February 1981, Joined Cases 122 and 123/79, Schiavo, [1981] ECR 473).

4. On the strength of all the foregoing considerations, I conclude by proposing that the Court should allow the preliminary objection raised by the Commission and consequently hold the action brought by Angelo Valentini on 11 September 1984 to be inadmissible on the ground that it was out of time.

1 Translated from the Italian.