Decision precludes a fifth Court of Justice ruling in a line of litigation which dates back to 1989.
07 August 2025
In a sudden and unexpected about-face, with a hearing imminent before the Court of Justice, the European Commission has decided to close the Lettori case, the longest-running case of discrimination in the history of the European Union. The decision, of which the Commission did not give public notice, was taken on 17 July.
The sudden decision to close is completely at variance with the Commission’s earlier public position on the case. In a reply of 10 June to a parliamentary question from Irish MEP and barrister, Cynthia Ní Mhurchú, the responsible Commissioner and Vice-President of the Commission, Roxanna Mînzatu, informed MEP Ní Mhurchú that “Case C-519/23 is currently pending at the Court of Justice.”
Failure to inform complainants
In advance of any decision to close an infringement case, the Commission is required to inform the complainants of its intentions and to take into account their eventual observations and objections. The Commission neglected to follow this obligatory procedure in the Lettori case.
In a letter to Asso.CEL.L, a Lettori union and an official complainant in the infringement case against Italy, the Commission wrote that because of exceptional circumstances “the complainants could not be informed about the decision to withdraw in advance.”
Had it gone to the Court for a ruling, Case C-519/23 would have been the fifth case in a line of litigation which dates back to the first Allué ruling of the Court of Justice in 1989. The duration of the litigation begs an explanation of what the “exceptional circumstances” were which led the Commission to close the case without informing the complainants.
Investigative journalism into the Commission’s sudden decision to close the case is hindered by the fact that evidence from Italy, the Member State in breach, is protected by the confidentiality requirement of infringement proceedings. Nevertheless, enough facts have emerged which call into serious question the Commission’s conduct of the case. Chief among these is the Commission’s refusal to consider Census evidence from Lettori that it itself had explicitly requested and its uncritical acceptance of the data from defendant Italy. Troubling also is the evasion on the part of the Commission of written questions from euro parliamentarians about the case or, in the case of a very pertinent question from MEP Michael McNamara, an outright failure to answer.
Lettori Census evidence v Italy’s evidence
In April 2021, Lettori association Asso.CEL.L and FLC CGIL, Italy’s largest trade union, together conducted their first national Census of Discriminatory Conditions in Italian universities. The administration of then Commissioner Nicolas Schmit, Roxana Mînzatu’s immediate predecessor, welcomed the results and promised to use the Census data “in the dialogue with the Italian authorities”. Undoubtedly influenced by the Census data, the Commission went on to open infringement proceedings against Italy in September 2021.
In July 2023, almost 2 years later, and still within the mandate of Commissioner Schmit, the case was referred to the Court of Justice. In the accompanying press release the Commission explained that the referral to the Court was due to the fact that “the majority of universities in Italy did not take the steps needed for a correct reconstruction of the Lettori’s careers”. “As a consequence”, the Commission added, “most foreign lecturers have still not received the money and benefits to which they are entitled.”
Both Asso.CEL.L and FLC CGIL remained in contact with the Commission after the referral to the Court and the change of Commissioners, pointing out that the grounds for referral cited in the press release persisted. Updates of the Census were sent to the Commission services.
In a letter of February 2025 to FLC CGIL, the Commission wrote that in October 2024 it had been informed by Italy that “the administrative procedure for the payment of arrears due to all eligible former lettori, insofar as covered by the infringement procedure C-519/23, has been completed.” It invited FLC CGIL to share evidence to the contrary within a deadline of one month “given that the case C-519/23 is pending”.
To facilitate the gathering of appropriate evidence, FLC CGIL asked to see the Italian data to which it had been asked to respond. The request was refused by the Commission on the grounds that Italy’s data was confidential.
Within the tight time limit imposed, Asso.CEL.L and FLC CGIL conducted a further national Census. Contrary to what had been affirmed by Italy, the results revealed that in 31 of the 39 participating universities no settlements were made with Lettori to compensate for decades of discriminatory treatment. Aggregate university-by-university Census results were communicated to the Commission in March 2025.
Commission declines to examine Lettori evidence
In reply Mario Nava, Director-General of Employment and Social Affairs, wrote that, as previously agreed, the Commission would not examine the Census information but instead would transmit it to the Italian authorities for their observations. This pretence was to shake what up to then had been a widespread Lettori confidence in the Commission’s conduct of its role as Guardian of the Treaty.
Out of an instinctive respect for the integrity of the Commission, the Lettori attentively reread the pertinent correspondence. The letters confirm that no such arrangement had been agreed between the Commission and the unions. As pointed out by FLC CGIL Secretary-General Secretary Gianna Fracassi in her response to Mario Nava, “it was the expectation of the union that the Commission, as Guardian of the Treaty, would examine the results of the census we conducted”.
FLC CGIL went on to point out that while it had no objections to the Commission forwarding the Census data to Italy, it would not consent to a situation whereby Italy would substitute the Commission as arbiter of Lettori evidence given its long record of non-compliance with the case law of the Court of Justice and its position as the defendant in the infringement case.
Yet this in effect is what the Commission has allowed to happen. By refusing to examine the evidence from Lettori, by suddenly closing the case and thus precluding the Court of Justice from ruling on the merits, the Commission has given credence to evidence from Italy, evidence which is shielded from public scrutiny and challenge.
The unanswered written question from MEP Michael McNamara
Just as the Commission is required to give notice to complainants of its intentions to close a case, so too it is required to answer written parliamentary questions within a period of 6 weeks. Submitted on March 14, a question from Michael McNamara still remains unanswered.
MEP McNamara in his question invited the Commission to learn from the miscarriage of justice which occurred in the second of the infringement cases against Italy. In that case Italy was spared daily fines of €309,750 because the Commission depositions contained no information to refute its claims that it had made the settlements due to the Lettori under the terms of a last-minute law it had enacted. The confidentiality requirement precluded the Lettori from seeing and challenging Italy’s submissions.
To prevent a repeat of such an injustice. MEP McNamara called on the Commission to this time “check university-by-university with the foreign language lecturers to ensure that the correct settlements due under EU law have been made.” The Commission both failed to respond to the question and to take the precautions requested.
Lettori response to the Commission decision
Representative Lettori reactions to the Commission decision are gathered in the comments beneath an earlier European Times You Tube broadcast on the case. The contributors, none of whom have received the settlements for reconstruction of career due under EU law, express incredulity that their bona fides Census evidence should have been ignored by the Commission and credence given to the depositions of an intransigent Member State which has refused to implement 4 rulings of the Court of Justice. In this regard it is worth recalling that back in 1996, when then Commissioner Padraig Flynn opened the proceedings which led to the first Court of Justice infringement ruling against Italy, he noted that Italy’s unwillingness to cooperate was “not compatible with the duty of loyal cooperation required by Article 5 of the Treaty”. He also specifically acknowledged the input of the Lettori and Members of the European Parliament to the proceedings.
Why then did the Commission drop the Lettori case? Recent scholarship suggests that the Commission has become highly political in the use of the infringement proceedings, to the detriment of the rule of law, and of standing up firmly against Member States which are breaching EU law. So, it is feasible that the Commission caved in to pressure from Italy to close the case.
Another possibility is that the Commission feared rebuke from the Court of Justice over the weaknesses in its case. In the second of its infringement rulings the Court noted that the Commission depositions lacked evidence from the Lettori to counter Italy’s claim that it had made the settlements due under EU law for reconstruction of career. An open letter of January 2025 to Commission President von der Leyen pinpointed other weaknesses in the Commission case. These included a failure to challenge the Gelmini Law, a retrospective piece of Italian legislation introduced to interpret the second infringement ruling of the Court of Justice and in the process to limit the settlements due to Lettori.
One of the conclusions of the open letter was that the confidentiality requirement of the infringement proceedings can work to the advantage of the Member State in breach. The Commission decision to suddenly drop the Lettori case bears this out. In the interests of European citizenry and of Treaty justice, the confidentiality requirement needs to be dropped.
The timing of the sudden Commission decision is unfortunate for the Lettori. The European parliament and domestic parliaments are in recess. Legal advisors are also on vacation. In September the Lettori will collectively consider their options. In the interim Asso.CEL.L will prepare a formal complaint to the European Ombudsman on the Commission’s handling of the case.
