Opinion of Mr Advocate General Tesauro delivered on 16 January 1992

1 Original language: Italian.

2 Article 85a(l) provides Where the death, accident, injury or sickness of a person covered by these Staff Regulations is caused by a third party, the Communities shall, in respect of the obligations incumbent upon them under the Staff Regulations consequent upon the event causing such death, injury or sickness, stand subrogated to the rights, including rights of action, of the victim or of those enuded under him against the third party.

3 Joined Cases 63/79 and 64/79 Boizard v Commission [1980] ECR 2975, Opinion at p. 2992, in particular p. 2998.

4 I would point out that in the laws of all the Member States, the concept of subrogation relates exclusively to the subrogee's assumption of the rights of the subrogor as a result of, and after, the payment.

5 Case 103/81 Ckaumont-Battkd v Parliament [1982] ECR 1003, paragraph 11 of the judgment.

6 Case 137/80 Commission v Belgium [1981] ECR 2393, paragraph 8 of thè judgment.

7 It is perhaps not inappropriate to point out that the Staff Regulations apply to people covered by an official's insurance and that, as far as medical and pharmaceutical expenses are concerned, the Communities' right of subrogation extends to those benefits as well.

8 In particular, having regard to everything said in the course of the proceedings, I would emphasize that even the Luxembourg legislation referred to, on the basis of which the social security authorities are subrogated to the rights of the insured as soon as the harmful event occurs and thus enjoy their own right of recourse against third parties, provides that where, despite the existence of the machinery thus created, the insured hás already received compensation for the damage from the third party responsible, the social security authority will set off against the benefits due to the victim the amount received by the latter from the third parry (Articles 118 and 237 of the Code des Assurances Sociales).