Alcogroup v Commission: More on Inspections and the Concept of a Reviewable Act

Abstract

Case T-274/15, Alcogroup and Alcodis v Commission, 10 April 2018 The General Court (‘GC’) dismissed as inadmissible an action for annulment against a Commission inspection decision and a letter refusing to end investigative measures. In 2013, the Commission started to investigate the biofuels sector (the ‘first investigation’) leading to inspections being carried out at the premises of Alcogroup and Alcodis (together, the ‘Applicants’) in October 2014 (the ‘first inspection’). All emails and documents exchanged between the Applicants and their external counsel for the purpose of preparing their defence were labelled ‘legally privileged’. Simultaneously, the Commission launched an investigation in the bioethanol sector (the ‘second investigation’) and carried out inspections at the Applicants’ premises in March 2015 (the ‘second inspection’). Inspectors searched the Applicants’ IT environment and copied large series of documents. Documents labelled as being ‘legally privileged’ were saved in a separate folder for the purpose of determining their status later during the inspection. After a quick examination on the spot of some of these documents, the Commission set all of them aside as either irrelevant or potentially covered by legal professional privilege (‘LPP’). One document was, however, isolated and seized in a sealed envelope but ultimately returned to the Applicants, in its sealed envelope, on 16 April 2015. Consequently, not a single document claimed by the Applicants to be covered by LPP was eventually placed in the Commission’s case file.