Today, Commission informed us that it decided to bring an action for annulment of Council decision regarding adjustments to remunerations and pensions of EU civil servants before the Court of Justice. The reasoning for this action is that the Council refused to abide by the legally binding rules of the METHOD laid down in the Staff Regulations and haphazardly decided to reduce the figures as it wished.
In the Commission's opinion, the Council has not respected the link between the annual adjustment and the evolution of purchasing power for the member states' civil servants and has not respected the Staff Regulations.


SID welcomes the decision of Commission to take legal action on this occasion.

On 25 November 2009, the Council Working Group on the Staff Regulations discussed the Commission proposal for a Council Regulation adjusting remuneration and pensions.

There were 15 Member States which expressed their disagreement with the Commission proposal.

As the issue could not be solved at the working group level, and the Commission refused to issue a different proposal, the question will be submitted to COREPER most likely next week.

The net impact of the annual adjustment, the increase in the pension contribution rate and in the special levy is 3.3%, as the effect of the pension contribution rate is -0.25 and the special levy is -0.15 percentage points.

SID's petition to European Parliament against the discrimination towards Contractual Agents has now been accepted by the Petition Committee as a valid petition.