ECJ confirms discretion to exclude tenderers for not updating self-certifications and points towards potential general obligation of sincere cooperation (C-178/16)

In its Judgment of 20 December 2017 in Impresa di Costruzioni Ing. E. Mantovani and RTI Mantovani e Guerrato, C-178/16, EU:C:2017:1000 (Mantovani e Guerrato), the Court of Justice (ECJ) declared the compatibility with the 2004 EU public procurement rules of a contracting authority's decision to exclude an economic operator that, having self-certified as not being affected by exclusion grounds, subsequently failed to update the contracting authority when one of its former directors' criminal conviction for invoice fraud became final. Remarkably, the exclusion was upheld despite the fact that the 'conviction had become final following [the economic operator's] own declarations [and despite the fact ...] that, in order to fully and effectively dissociate the company from [its director]’s actions, the latter was immediately removed from his management role ..., the management bodies of the company had been reorganised, [his] shares had been bought back and an action for damages had been brought against him' (para 11). Therefore, the exclusion was upheld despite an attempt at self-cleaning. 

In declaring the compatibility with EU procurement law of this strict approach in the exercise of discretionary exclusion powers, the ECJ largely followed the Opinion of AG Campos Sánchez-Bordona (discussed here, where more background on the case is provided) and, in my view, confirmed a welcome functional approach to the exercise of discretion to exclude economic operators on the grounds of evidence that the economic operator is guilty of grave professional misconduct, which renders its integrity questionable [Art 45(2)(d) Dir 2004/18 and now Art 57(4)(c) Dir 2014/24]. In my view, there are some relevant passages in the Mantovani e Guerrato Judgment that will be of importance in the assessment of self-cleaning claims under the 2014 rules, given the recognition of the possibility for Member States to create an overarching obligation of sincere cooperation with the contracting authority befalling upon economic operators under the 2004 rules--which may well carry over to the new provisions at EU level. The relevance of such recognition of a general obligation stems from its crucial role in the original exclusion decision, which was 'in essence, [based on the fact] that although, in the absence of a final judgment, Mantovani’s statement could not be classified as a "misrepresentation", the lack of timely notification of criminal proceedings concerning one of the [relevant] persons ... may constitute an infringement of the obligation of sincere cooperation with the contracting authority, and accordingly impede the full and effective dissociation from the person concerned' (para 12).

In my view, it is important to stress that the ECJ reaches its position after reiterating its general case law position that

... Article 45(2) of Directive 2004/18 does not provide for uniform application at EU level of the grounds of exclusion it mentions, since the Member States may choose not to apply those grounds of exclusion, or to incorporate them into national law with varying degrees of rigour according to legal, economic or social considerations prevailing at national level. In that context, Member States have the power to make the criteria laid down in Article 45(2) less onerous or more flexible ... Member States therefore enjoy some discretion in determining the requirements governing the application of the optional grounds for exclusion laid down in Article 45(2) of Directive 2004/18 (paras 31-32, references omitted).

And it is also important to stress that the ECJ finds the legal basis for the obligation of sincere cooperation not on the 2004 EU procurement rules, but on the domestic law of the Member State concerned (Italy):

... the Member State is entitled to ease the requirements governing the application of the optional grounds for exclusion and, thus, to waive the application of a ground for exclusion in the event of a dissociation between the tenderer and the conduct constituting an offence. In the present case, it is also entitled to determine the requirements governing that dissociation and to require, as Italian law does, that the tenderer inform the contracting authority of a conviction of its director, even if the conviction is not yet final.

The tendering company, which must meet those requirements, may submit all the evidence which, in its view, is evidence of such a dissociation.

If that dissociation cannot be proved to the satisfaction of the contracting authority, the necessary consequence is the application of the ground for exclusion.

... in a situation where the judgment relating to an offence concerning the professional conduct of the director of a tendering company is not yet final, Article 45(2)(d) of Directive 2004/18 may apply. That provision makes it possible to exclude a tendering company which has been found guilty of grave professional misconduct, established by any means which the contracting authorities can provide proof of (paras 41-44).

Even if the ECJ seems to incur in some imprecision in interpreting Italian law (which, as far as I can see, did not require the tenderer to inform the contracting authority of the non-final conviction of its former director, but rather to update or substitute the relevant self-certification once that conviction becomes final), it seems clear that it foresees the possibility for Member States to create an overarching obligation of sincere cooperation as part of the relevant self-cleaning requirements. Given that self-cleaning was not regulated by Dir 2004/18, this is the only legal basis that could have been used in the case. However, given the inclusion of explicit rules in Dir 2014/24, an argument can be made that the ratio of the Mantovani e Guerrato Judgment will carry over to the new EU self-cleaning regime.

Indeed, when the functional principle underlying the Mantovani e Guerrato Judgment is put in connection with the new rules in Article 57(6) of Dir 2014/24, the legal basis of such an overarching obligation may now be seen as having potentially shifted to the EU level. Indeed, it is important to stress that, as minimum requirements for the recognition of self-cleaning capable of excluding the application of exclusion grounds (both mandatory and discretionary), the second paragraph of Art 57(6) Dir 2014/24 requires that 'the economic operator shall prove that it has paid or undertaken to pay compensation in respect of any damage caused by the criminal offence or misconduct, clarified the facts and circumstances in a comprehensive manner by actively collaborating with the investigating authorities and taken concrete technical, organisational and personnel measures that are appropriate to prevent further criminal offences or misconduct' (emphasis added).

This comes to establish an 'EU obligation of sincere cooperation' that, even if it seems oriented towards the 'investigating authorities' (which does not seem to automatically cover the contracting authority itself), can easily be extended in the same functional terms required by Italian law on the basis of the logic in the Mantovani e Guerrato Judgment. Therefore, in my view, when assessing self-cleaning claims--and as a result of a joint interpretation of Art 57(4)(c) and Art 57(6)II Dir 2014/24 from the functional perspective of the Mantovani e Guerrato Judgment--contracting authorities will be on safe grounds if they decide to reject self-cleaning claims on the basis of a lack of update of on-going criminal and administrative investigations that are susceptible of nullifying the effectiveness of self-certifications submitted by the economic operators concerned.

ECJ backs up tough Italian approach to exclusion of non-payers of social security contributions -- will this carry on under Directive 2014/24? (C-199/15)

In its Judgment of 10 November 2016 in Ciclat, C-199/15, EU:C:2016:853 (only in FR and IT), the European Court of Justice (ECJ) has issued a preliminary ruling concerning the compatibility with the pre-2014 EU public procurement rules (Dir 2004/18) of a set of Italian rules that mandates the exclusion of undertakings that have been found to have gravely failed to meet all their social security obligations at the time of the tender, and irrespective of any subsequent regularisation of the situation prior to the award of the contract, or even prior to the assessment of that situation by the contracting authority.

According to the relevant Italian rules, contracting authorities must exclude undertakings that have been definitively found to have committed serious offences regarding the payment of social security contributions in accordance with Italian legislation or that of the State in which they are established (C-199/15, para 8, own translation from French). The only tolerance against this ground of mandatory exclusion is that an offence against the social security will not be considered grave where the difference between the sums owed and those paid does not exceed EUR 100 and is less than 5% of the sums owed (C-199/15, para 11, own translation from French). 

The Ciclat case can be seen as a twin of the previous Judgment of 10 July 2014 in Consorzio Stabile Libor Lavori Pubblici (C-358/12, EU:C:2014:2063) where the ECJ assessed the compatibility with EU law of the same Italian rules for the exclusion of undertakings that have committed serious offences against the social security of their country of establishment, but in the context of the procurement of contracts below the EU thresholds. In that case, the ECJ considered that the Italian rule was compatible with Articles 49 TFEU and 56 TFEU and the principle of proportionality. Equally and unsurprisingly, in Ciclat, the ECJ has determined that

Article 45 of Directive 2004/18 ... does not preclude national legislation ... which obliges contracting authorities to consider as grounds for exclusion an offense in relation to the payment of social security contributions, which is established in a certificate automatically requested by the contracting authority and issued by the social security institutions, where such infringement existed at the date of participation in a tender, even if it no longer existed on the date of the award of the contract or that of the automatic control by the contracting authority (C-199/15, para 40, own translation from French). 

Despite not advancing EU public procurement law in any relevant way, the Ciclat Judgment can be criticised on two accounts.

First, because the ECJ ducked a relevant question of reverse discrimination due to the different documentary rules applicable to Italian companies (which were subject to the stringent system of automatic certification by the social security administration that gave rise to the case), whereas non-Italian EU tenderers could benefit from the greater flexibility of self-certification (see C-199/15, paras 38-39). At some point, the ECJ will have to stop avoiding problematic issues of reverse discrimination and start constructing a better line of case law that is more attuned to the needs of undertakings competing in an internal market.

Second, the Ciclat Judgment can be criticised for its excessive rigidity. Not only due to the lack of consideration of the very low threshold amounts of tolerance for unpaid social security contributions (or taxes)--which was already the position after Consorzio Stabile Libor Lavori Pubblici--but also due to the irrelevance given to an effective remediation of the infringement by the tenderer, which goes against trends aimed at facilitating substantial compliance and corporate (voluntary) self-cleaning. 

However, this second criticism may seem as not really relevant from a practical perspective in view of the greater flexibility that Article 57(2) Dir 2014/24 has introduced if compared with Art 45 Dir 2004/18 (see discussion here). Indeed, under the 2014 rules, exclusion on the basis of an infringement of social security law (or tax law), even if the infringement has been established by a judicial or administrative decision having final and binding effect in accordance with the legal provisions of the country in which it is established, this exclusion ground will cease to apply where "the economic operator has fulfilled its obligations by paying or entering into a binding arrangement with a view to paying the taxes or social security contributions due, including, where applicable, any interest accrued or fines."

But a close consideration of this provision shows that the moment in which consideration must be paid by the contracting authority to the remedial action taken by the tenderer that was initially found to infringe social security (or tax) law is not specified, and therefore left to the national implementing conditions adopted in each Member State on the basis of Art 57(7) Dir 2014/24. Thus, a possible reading of Ciclat would be to consider that it is compatible with EU procurement law to establish the last date for the submission of tenders as the cut-off date for the assessment of compliance with (or remedy of an infringement of) social security (and tax) law--to the exclusion of any remedial action taken before the contracting authority evaluates the tenders, or even before the contracting authority actually assesses compliance with exclusion and selection criteria. In my view, that would deprive the new rules in Art 57(2) [and, for the same reasons, in Art 57(6) on self-cleaning] of practical effect.

Consequently, the Ciclat Judgment keeps adding reasons to the need to establish a special inter partes procedure where the contracting authority gives a chance to the undertaking to clarify its current situation of compliance or not with social security (and tax) requirements [but, more generally, in relation to any exclusion ground the contracting authority aims to enforce] before proceeding to its effective exclusion. This is not only a practical need, but a requirement derived from the general principles in the EU public procurement Directives and, more generally, the duty of good administration of Art 41 of the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union. Fur further discussion of this important issue, see A Sanchez-Graells, "If it Ain't Broke, Don't Fix It’? EU Requirements of Administrative Oversight and Judicial Protection for Public Contracts", to be published in S Torricelli & F Folliot Lalliot (eds), Administrative oversight and judicial protection for public contracts (Larcier, 2017) forthcoming.

CJEU makes interesting points regarding illegal presumptions of restriction of competition in public procurement (C-425/14)

In its Judgment in Impresa Edilux and SICEF, C-425/14, EU:C:2015:721, the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) was asked to establish the parameters under which an economic operator can be excluded from a procurement procedure below EU thresholds for not supplying a declaration of acceptance of a legality protocol on combating criminal activity. This case is interesting because it involves the use of self-declarations as participation requirements in procurement procedures, which is bound to gain more and more importance under Directive 2014/24.

However, the Judgment in Impresa Edilux and SICEF is also remarkable because the CJEU (maybe only by coincidence) makes very important points regarding the establishment of excessive presumptions of restrictions of competition as part of this type of self-declarations. By looking in detail at the content of the declarations required from interested tenderers, the CJEU identifies a public procurement practice that results in the establishment of irrebutable presumptions of distortion of competition that go beyond what is required to uphold the principle of competition in the public procurement setting. In doing so, the CJEU establishes clear red lines regarding this type of presumptions.

This blog post focuses on both sets of issues in turn. First, it concentrates on the analysis of anti-criminal activity protocols and self-declarations. Secondly, it moves on to assess the treatment of the presumptions of competitive distortion that can derive from certain types of self-declarations.

1. Compatibility of anti-criminal activity protocols with EU procurement rules

The case at hand concerned public procurement in Italy, where Article 1(17) of Law No 190 on measures for the prevention and suppression of corruption and illegal conduct in the public administration of 6 November 2012 (‘Law No 190/2012’) foresees that ‘Contracting authorities may state in public procurement notices... that failure to comply with the clauses of legality protocols or integrity agreements is to constitute a ground for exclusion from the tendering procedure.’ 

The CJEU emphasises that, according to the referring court (ie the Council of Administrative Justice for the Region of Sicily, Italy), 'the purpose of introducing legality protocols into Italian law is to prevent and combat the pernicious phenomenon of the infiltration of organised crime, firmly entrenched in some regions of southern Italy, into the public procurement sector. The referring court takes the view that those protocols are also essential in order to protect the fundamental principles of competition and transparency underlying Italian and EU public procurement legislation' (C-425/14, para 13).

Thus, the main legal issue put to the CJEU for preliminary interpretation concerned the compatibility of exclusion grounds such as that of Article 1(17) of Law No 190/2012 with EU law in the case of public procurement procedures not covered by the relevant EU rules because the value of the contract does not meet the relevant thresholds. 

This is an important point to note. Should the value of the contract have met or exceeded the EU thresholds, the case would have concerned the compatibility of such exclusion ground with the specific rules of Article 45 of Directive 2004/18 now repealed by Article 57 of Directive 2014/24 (which, for these purposes, is fundamentally equivalent). This could have altered the legal analysis in view of the constant case law of the CJEU that interprets the exclusion clauses in Art 45 Dir 2004/18 (and now Art 57 Dir 2014/18) as listing exhaustively the grounds based on objective considerations of professional quality which can serve to justify the exclusion of a contractor from participation in a public contract. 

That is, the constant position in the case law that those provisions preclude Member States or contracting authorities from adding other grounds for exclusion based on criteria relating to the professional qualities of the candidate or tenderer, and more specifically professional honesty, solvency, and economic and financial capacity (see Case 76/81 Transporoute [1982] ECR 417 para 9; Joined Cases C-226/04 and C-228/04 La Cascina [2006] ECR I-1347 para 21–22; and Case C-213/07 Mikhaniki [2008] ECR I-9999 para 40–43. This has recently been reiterated in case C-376/08 Serrantoni and Consorzio stabile edili [2009] ECR I-12169 para 31; C-74/09 Bâtiments and Ponts Construction and WISAG Produktionsservice [2010] ECR I-7271 para 43; and Case Forposta and ABC Direct Contact, C-465/11, EU:C:2012:801 para 38]. 

As the referring court indicated, this would have required an assessment of the extent to which 'Article 1(17) of Law No 190/2012 could be consistent with the third sentence of Article 45(1) of [Directive 2004/18], which, in its view, provides a derogation from the exhaustive nature of the grounds for exclusion for overriding requirements in the general interest, such as those relating to public order and the prevention of crime.' In my view, that would not be possible under Art 45(1) 2004/18 and much less now under the revised wording of Art 57(3) of Directive 2014/24. 

However, given that the contract in the case at hand was below the thresholds, the CJEU did not assess such compatibility with Art 45 Dir 2004/18 (Art 57 Dir 2014/24), and ruled exclusively in relation to the general principles of EU public procurement law (paras 18-24). Indeed, the CJEU reformulated the question in the following terms:

whether the fundamental rules and general principles of the Treaty, in particular the principles of equal treatment and of non-discrimination and the consequent obligation of transparency, must be interpreted as precluding a provision of national law under which a contracting authority may provide that a candidate or tenderer be excluded from a tendering procedure relating to a public procurement contract for not having lodged, with its tender, a written acceptance of the commitments and declarations contained in a legality protocol, such as that at issue in the main proceedings, the purpose of which is to prevent organised crime infiltrating the public procurement sector (C-425/14, para 25).

In answering that question, the CJEU makes a couple of interesting points:

28 It is clear that, by preventing criminal activity and distortions of competition in the public contracts sector, a measure such as the obligation to declare acceptance of that type of legality protocol appears to be such as to strengthen equal treatment and transparency in procurement procedures. In addition, inasmuch as that obligation is incumbent upon every candidate or concession-holder without distinction, it does not conflict with the principle of non-discrimination.

29 However, in accordance with the principle of proportionality, which constitutes a general principle of EU law, such a measure must not go beyond what is necessary to achieve the intended objective (see, to that effect, judgment in Serrantoni and Consorzio stabile edili, C-376/08, EU:C:2009:808, paragraph 33 and the case-law cited).

30 In that regard, it is appropriate ... to reject Edilux and SICEF’s argument that a declaration of acceptance of certain commitments is an ineffective means of combatting the infiltration of organised crime since observance of those commitments can be determined only after the contract concerned has been awarded. ...

32 ... as regards the content of the legality protocol ..., the commitments which must be given by candidates or tenderers under subparagraphs (a) to (d) of the legality protocol are, in essence, to indicate the progress of the works, the purpose, amount and recipients of subcontracts and derived contracts and the procedures for selecting contractors; to report any attempted interference, irregularity or distortion in the conduct of the tendering procedure and during performance of the contract, to cooperate with the police, by reporting any attempt at extortion, intimidation or influence of a criminal nature, and to include the same clauses in subcontracts. Those commitments overlap with the declarations contained in that protocol, under subparagraphs (h) to (j).

33 As regards a declaration such as that in subparagraph (g) of the legality protocol at issue in the main proceedings, whereby the participant declares that it has not concluded and will not conclude any agreement with other participants in the tendering procedure seeking to restrict or avoid competition, it is limited to the purpose of protecting the principles of competition and transparency in public procurement procedures.

34 Such commitments and declarations concern the honest conduct of the candidate or tenderer towards the contracting authority at issue in the main proceedings and cooperation with law enforcement. They do not, therefore, go beyond what is necessary in order to prevent organised crime infiltrating the public contract awards sector (C-425/14, paras 28-34, emphasis added).

Up to this point, the Judgment in Impresa Edilux and SICEF remains within what could be expected and the CJEU takes the chance to support Member States measures to prevent organised criminality where those initiatives do not conflict with explicit EU rules. As I mentioned, I am not sure that the same result would have been possible under the rules of Art 45 Dir 2004/18, or now Art 57 Dir 2014/24, unless the CJEU engaged in a line of reasoning along the lines followed in para 33 and opened the door to exclusion grounds that can be interpreted as remaining sufficiently close to the grounds actually listed in those provisions--and, in the case at hand, establishing a sufficient link with the mandatory grounds for exclusion based on participation in a criminal organisation or corruption, as regulated in Art 57(1)(a) and (b) of Directive 2014/24.

Moreover, along these same lines, the CJEU stresses that requiring a declaration to the effect of ensuring that the tenderer has not entered into anticompetitive agreements is not disproportionate--which seems useful for the interpretation of Art 59 Dir 2014/24 regarding the self-declarations that can be required from economic operators under the new mechanism of the European Single Procurement Document (ESPD). Therefore, up to this point, the case is useful but not necessarily ground-breaking.

Nonetheless, the specifics of the reasoning of the CJEU hide another interesting dimension of the case that, as mentioned, concerns a public procurement practice that results in the establishment of irrebutable presumptions of distortion of competition that go beyond what is required to uphold the principle of competition in the public procurement setting. We now turn to this second dimension of the Judgment in Impresa Edilux and SICEF.

2. Incompatibility of undercover or disguised restrictions of competition

Interestingly, after dealing with those core issues of the case, the CJEU keeps on with the very detailed assessment of the content of the specific declaration of acceptance of the legality protocol on combating criminal activity that was required from the tenderers. The purpose of this analysis is to exhaust the issue of proportionality but, maybe as a coincidence and in any case as a positive spillover, brings to light the fact that some of these protocols can include disguised measures restricting competition in terms of unduly preventing cooperation between undertakings, including  legitimate subcontracting.

In the specific case, the issue was that the required declaration included some requirements not necessarily linked with criminal behaviour, such as the obligation of participating tenderers to 'expressly and solemnly declare' that they: (e) are 'not in a relationship of control or association (legal and/or factual) with other competitors and that [they have] not concluded and will not conclude any agreement with other participants in the tendering procedure'; or (f) 'will not subcontract any type of tasks to other companies participating in the tender [...] and [are] aware of the fact that, otherwise, those subcontracts will not be authorised'. 

The CJEU assesses this requirement as follows:

36 ... it follows from the case-law of the Court that the automatic exclusion of candidates or tenderers who are in such a relationship [of control or of association] with other candidates or tenderers goes beyond what is necessary to prevent collusive behaviour and, therefore, to ensure the application of the principle of equal treatment and observance of the obligation of transparency. Such an automatic exclusion constitutes an irrebutable presumption of mutual interference in the respective tenders, for the same contract, of undertakings linked by a relationship of control or of association. Accordingly, it precludes the possibility for those candidates or tenderers of showing that their tenders are independent and is therefore contrary to the EU interest in ensuring the widest possible participation by tenderers in a call for tenders (see, to that effect, judgments in Assitur, C-538/07, EU:C:2009:317, paragraphs 28 to 30, and Serrantoni and Consorzio stabile edili, C-376/08, EU:C:2009:808, paragraphs 39 and 40).

37 ... the legality protocol also includes a declaration that the participant has not concluded and will not conclude any agreement with other participants in the tendering procedure. By excluding in this way any agreements between the participants, including agreements not capable of restricting competition, such a declaration goes beyond what is necessary to safeguard the principle of competition in the public procurement sector.

38 It follows that an obligation for a participant in a tendering procedure to declare, on the one hand, that it is not in a relationship of control or of association with other competitors and, on the other, that it has not concluded any agreement with other participants in the tendering procedure, with the consequence that, failing such a declaration, that participant is automatically excluded from that procedure, infringes the principle of proportionality.

39 Similar considerations must also apply as regards the declaration ... by which the participant declares that it will not subcontract any type of tasks to other undertakings participating in the tendering procedure and is aware of the fact that, otherwise, those subcontracts will not be authorised. In fact, such a declaration involves an irrebuttable presumption that any subcontract by the successful tenderer, after the contract has been awarded, to another participant in the same call for tenders resulted from collusion between the two undertakings concerned, without giving them the opportunity to show that is not the case. Thus, such a declaration goes beyond what is necessary to prevent collusive behaviour (C-425/14, paras 36-39, emphasis added).

These arguments of the CJEU should not be lost as a result of the apparently technical and disconnected case in which they have been made. They are essential to the assessment of the compatibility with EU law of collaboration agreements between (otherwise) competing undertakings for the tendering and execution of public contracts. In my view, these are very positive approaches by the CJEU to the issue of collaboration between tenderers and subcontracting schemes, not least because they are in line with Article 101 TFEU--and particularly 101(3) TFEU--in terms of potential justification of economically efficient instances of cooperation between economic operators.

In that regard, I consider that the CJEU has pushed for the preservation of sufficient space for a competition-law compliant analysis of teaming, joint bidding and subcontracting arrangements, for which I advocate in Public Procurement and the EU Competition Rules, 2nd edn (Oxford, Hart, 2015) 336-340 and 353-355. In particular, I find this development particularly in line with the following arguments (p 294):

... the establishment of grounds for exclusion that tend to narrow down excessively the pool of potential participants in a tender, or that completely exclude a given type or entire category of potential bidders, will need to be scrutinised carefully. This will be one of the cases where the application of the principle of proportionality alone might be insufficient (see above chapter five) and where a purposive interpretation might be required to ensure a more pro-competitive outcome. Additional grounds for exclusion will therefore not only need to be proportionate, but should not generate unnecessary distortions to competition.

The argument can be pushed further to require that the additional rules for the exclusion of tenderers be designed exclusively to prevent undertakings from exploiting certain unlawful competitive advantages in the public procurement setting. As the ECJ has clarified, the purpose of the basic principles of equality and non-discrimination and the ensuing obligation of transparency is to guarantee that ‘tenderers [are] in a position of equality both when they formulate their tenders and when those tenders are being assessed by the contracting authority’.[1] Therefore, the underlying rationale of the system of exclusion of tenderers is to prevent the participation of tenderers that are ex ante advantaged vis-a-vis the rest of competitors from resulting in a breach of the principle of equal treatment. Hence, the additional grounds for exclusion established by Member States should be designed in such a way that only situations under which a potential competitive advantage is clearly envisioned are covered—ie, they should not be designed exclusively in accordance with formal considerations of equality or non-discrimination. Moreover, in their implementation, contracting authorities need to be able to prove the existence of an actual advantage for the candidate or tenderer whose exclusion is being considered,[2] and an opportunity to show that no such advantage exists in the particular instance under consideration should be granted to the affected candidate or tenderer (ie, the establishment of irrebuttable presumptions should not be allowed).[3]

Therefore, it is submitted that it should be expressly recognised and taken into account that the establishment of grounds for exclusion of tenderers other than those listed in article 57 of Directive 2014/24 needs to be based on competition considerations and, more specifically, aimed at preventing the exploitation of actual unlawful competitive advantages by candidates or tenderers—since the establishment of purely formal grounds for the exclusion of tenderers not justified by the existence of associated distortions of competition would unnecessarily restrict access to public procurement.

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[1] Case C-19/00 SIAC Construction [2001] ECR I-7725 34; Case C-448/01 EVN and Wienstrom [2003] ECR I-14527 47; and Case C-213/07 Mikhaniki [2008] ECR I-9999 45.

[2] Joined Cases C-21/03 and C-34/03 Fabricom [2005] ECR I-1559 33 and 35; and Case C-213/07 Mikhaniki [2008] ECR I-9999 62. For a recent application of the advantage criterion that, in our view, imposes an exceedingly demanding requirement as regards its proof, see Case T-4/13 Communicaid Group v Commission [2014] pub. electr. EU:T:2014:437.

[3] That would particularly be the case according to the reading of Fabricom made by the EGC, which has considered that the ECJ ‘held that a candidate or tenderer cannot automatically be excluded from a tendering procedure without having the opportunity to comment on the reasons justifying such exclusion’; Joined Cases T-376/05 and T-383/05 TEA–CEGOS [2006] ECR II-205 65. See also Case C-213/07 Mikhaniki [2008] ECR I-9999 69; Case C-538/07 Assitur [2009] ECR I-4219 30; and Opinion of AG Mazák in case C-538/07 Assitur 44 and fn 22, where it is argued that those measures may result in the exclusion of persons whose participation entails no risk whatsoever for the equal treatment of tenderers and the transparency of procedures for the award of public contracts—which is clearly undesirable.