Brussels, 29/03/2012 (Agence Europe) - On Wednesday 28 March (Judgment T-123/09), the General Court of the EU confirmed the Commission's decision of November 2008 (see EUROPE 9781) which: - rules as illegal the loan of €300 million granted by the Italian state in 2008 to the Italian airline Alitalia (at that point no longer able to pay its debts), and orders recovery of that aid from Alitalia; - authorises the sale, on the basis of evaluation by an independent expert (a bank), of certain Alitalia assets from the Compagnia Aerea Italiana (CAI), which had answered a call for declarations of interest issued for that purpose. It therefore rejects the appeal made by the Irish airline, Ryanair, which challenged these two decisions.
As far as the sale of Alitalia assets are concerned, the General Court indicates that the Commission had rightly concluded that this did not involve the granting of state aid to Alitalia buyers, being convinced by the Italian state's undertakings to sell these market assets further to an independent assessment of the offer. It rejects Ryanair's arguments that the Commission had carried out an insufficient or incomplete examination at the preliminary examination phase and should have initiated a formal investigation procedure on the sale of the assets, in order to verify the possible existence of options other than the sale of assets. The Court also rejects Ryanair's argument that the sale, in so far as it had been implicitly made subject to the condition that the buyer should be of Italian nationality, had implied a lowering of its price. It considers, on the contrary, that the Commission verified that the call for declarations of interest did not contain any discriminatory clause based on the nationality of the bidders and that it had received wide publicity on a national and international scale. Finally, the General Court states, the Commission correctly estimated that there was no “economic continuity between Alitalia and CAI” and that the latter did not benefit from any advantage, since all measures had been taken to ensure that the sale took place at a price not lower than the market price.
In its decision on the illegal nature of the loan, the General Court considers that, although Ryanair had played an active role in the procedure for the adoption of that decision - it has not demonstrated that the fact of ordering recovery of the aid from Alitalia (and not from CAI) substantially affected its competitive position. It follows that Ryanair has not demonstrated that it is individually concerned by that decision.
On the question of knowing who should reimburse the loan to Alitalia, described by the Commission as illegal aid, Competition Commissioner Joaquin Almunia said that the Commission should verify whether the General Court confirms its conception of “economic continuity” for companies bought up and whether, in the case in hand, it concludes like the Commission in the absence of economic continuity. Ryanair for its part has already decided to lodge an appeal against this General Court ruling which allows CAI, the new owner of Alitalia, to avoid repayment of €300 million in illegal state aid, and constitutes the umpteenth example of European Commission favouritism towards national companies in the EU. (FG/transl.jl)