President Roberta Metsola now needs to mandate the Parliament’s legal service to draft and file a case by Nov. 14, a Parliament official said, citing rules of procedure. If she intends to depart from JURI’s conclusions, she could also bring it to the Conference of Presidents or, in an unlikely scenario, submit it to a plenary vote, they added.
Fourteen MEPs voted in favor of the action, against eight who opposed it, the official said. The vote was held behind closed doors.
The motion was spearheaded by German Social Democrat René Repasi, coordinator for the Committee on Legal Affairs and standing rapporteur for disputes involving the Parliament.
“With today’s vote, we send a clear message: we will not stand by when the Commission oversteps its mandate,” Repasi said in an emailed statement following the vote.
“The Commission’s right to withdraw a proposal, as was conducted with the Standard-Essential Patents (SEP) proposal, cannot be used as a political instrument to short-circuit Parliament’s work or to enforce a deregulation agenda from above. This is not in line with how the democratic processes in the European Union are meant to function.”
Members of the European People’s Party, the center-right party allied to Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, were instructed to vote against taking legal action.
