Admissibility - State aid: The CFI adopts a slippery case-law relating to the right to be heard of the applicant for annulment of a decision declaring that an aid is incompatible (Ter Lembeek)

*This article is an automatic translation of the original article, provided here for your convenience. Read the original article. – CFI, 23 November 2006, Ter Lembeek International NV v Commission, Case T-217/02. The Ter Lembeek decision (see, on the merits, this review, State Aid column, note J.-Y. C.) illustrates the well-known tactic used by litigation specialists whereby a judge who decides to innovate sometimes does so as discreetly as possible. It is well known that one of the cardinal principles of the Community litigation on annulment is that the legality of the administrative act referred to the court for censure can only be reviewed in the light of the factual elements available to the administration when it adopted that act. The essential consequence of this principle is