Judgment_paragraph 1. · P. Dumortier frères SA and others v Council of the European Communities (C-64/76, C-113/76, C-167/78, C-239/78, C-27/79, C-28/79, C-45/79)

1.The Council points out that a trader who claims to be entitled to receive from a French body a payment to be borne by the European Agricultural Guidance and Guarantee Fund must bring an action before the administrative court, in which action such court has unlimited jurisdiction, seeking an order requiring the body responsible for payment to pay it the sum in question.However that may be, where an action for an abuse of powers is brought before the administrative court at the same time as an action under Article 215 of the Treaty before the Court of Justice, the Council considers itself obliged to plead lack of jurisdiction or inadmissibility with regard to the latter action for several reasons: first, because the applicant can bring an action before the administrative court, in which action such court has unlimited jurisdiction, and because that action, which is an action for the payment of a refund, takes precedence over an action for damages, which is not appropriate where it is still possible to bring an action for payment; also because that lack of jurisdiction ensues from the fact that there are concurrent proceedings, as a dispute concerning a claim for the same sum has been brought before courts belonging to two different systems.Similarly, where adversary proceedings before the national court, in which proceedings such court has unlimited jurisdiction, and an action for damages against the Community before the Court of Justice arise concurrently, the Council also considers that it must plead the inadmissibility of the latter action, as it finds the action before the national court the only appropriate one for the same reasons as those which it has just set out. On concurrency of proceedings, the Council refers to the judgment of the Court of 14 July 1967 in Joined Cases 5, 7 and 13 to 24/66 Kampffmeyer and Others v Commission [1967] ECR 245.The Council considers that that is the line followed by the Court in Cases 96/71 R & V Haegeman v Commission (judgment of 25 October 1972, [1972] ECR 1005), 99/74, Grands Moulins des Antilles v Commission (judgment of 26 November 1975 [1975] ECR 1531) and especially in Case 46/75 IBC v Commission (judgment of 27 January 1976, [1976] ECR 65).In its submission, those observations are equally valid when the applicants submit a supplementary claim for damages in respect of commercial loss, distinct from the claim for the payment of refunds and against which the same objection cannot be raised: a claim for the payment of refunds which is by nature inadmissible cannot be made admissible by joining to it a claim for damages in respect of commercial loss.As regards Cases 64 and 113/76, the Council admits that it did not submit a plea of inadmissibility in time. However, it considers that the foregoing considerations are no less applicable.