Summary
Keywords
Procedure - Costs - Taxation - Recoverable costs - Definition - Circumstances to be taken into account - Travel and subsistence expenses of persons other than the lawyers of the parties - Economists' fees - Conditions of recovery
(Rules of Procedure of the Court of First Instance, Arts 91(b) and 92(1))
Summary
The Community judicature is not empowered to tax the fees payable by the parties to their own lawyers but it may determine the amount of those fees which may be recovered from the party ordered to pay the costs. Since Community law does not contain any provisions laying down a scale of fees, the Court of First Instance must freely consider the facts of the case, taking into account the purpose and nature of the proceedings and their significance from the point of view of Community law, as well as the difficulties presented by the case, the amount of work generated by the dispute for the agents and advisers involved and the financial interest which the parties had in the proceedings.
Travel and subsistence expenses incurred by persons other than the lawyer of the applicant concerned are recoverable only if the presence of such persons was necessary for the purposes of the proceedings. The fees of an economist instructed by the applicant are to be considered necessary expenses only where the economist's involvement was necessary.
Since the Court takes account, in fixing the recoverable costs, of all the circumstances of the case up to the date when it makes its ruling, there is no need to give a separate ruling on the costs incurred by the parties in relation to proceedings for the taxation of costs.
Full & Egal Universal Law Academy