Information Note on the Court’s case-law 22
September 2000
Organisation nationale des syndicats d' infirmiers libéraux (O.N.S.I.L.) v. France (dec.) - 39971/98
Decision 29.8.2000 [Section III]
Article 6
Civil proceedings
Article 6-1
Fair hearing
Alleged interference by the legislative in court proceedings: inadmissible
The applicant is an organisation of trade unions representing self-employed nurses. After the Conseil d’État had quashed ministerial decrees approving two initial collective bargaining agreements applicable to self-employed nurses, a further agreement was reached and approved by a decree of 10 March 1996. The applicant organisation immediately made known its intention to seek an order quashing that decree. On 28 May 1996 Parliament adopted a statute validating the collective bargaining agreement concerned. Twenty-four hours later, on 21 June 1996, the applicant lodged an application with the Conseil d’État for an order quashing the decree. The Conseil d’État declared the application inadmissible as being devoid of purpose and dismissed the complaint of a violation of Article 6 § 1 of the Convention as being inapplicable. Relying on Article 6 § 1, the applicant alleged that the State had intervened in a decisive manner to influence proceedings to which it was a party in its own favour. The applicant also submitted that the statute that had been adopted had enabled the State to escape its obligations to give effect to a final decision.
Inadmissible under Article 6 § 1 – although the dispute could be regarded as coming within the scope of application of Article 6 § 1, it was unnecessary to decide that issue since the application was inadmissible for the following reasons. The legislature had intervened before the applicant had lodged its application with the Conseil d’État, at a time when the dispute, though likely, had not commenced and its outcome was uncertain. In any event, the legislature could have approved the collective bargaining agreement at the outset and no remedy would have been available to the applicant to challenge the statute. Accordingly, the Court could not accept that the statute had been adopted in order to pre-empt the litigation and to make its future outcome before the Conseil d’État inevitable. Nor could it accept that an infringement of the principle of equality of arms could result from measures “anticipating” proceedings that had yet to begin. Furthermore, Article 6 did not guarantee that final judgments in civil proceedings were immutable. In addition, it had not been established that the third agreement could be equated with the first two agreements, and affirming that the Conseil d’État would have quashed the decree of 10 April 1996 had it not been validated by the statute amounted to speculating on the decision that would have been taken: manifestly ill-founded.
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This summary by the Registry does not bind the Court.
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