THIRD SECTION

DECISION

Application no. 5248/19 ARES CHOFER CANARIAS S.L.U. against Spain

The European Court of Human Rights (Third Section), sitting on 12 October 2021 as a Committee composed of:

Darian Pavli, President, María Elósegui, Frédéric Krenc, judges, and Olga Chernishova, Deputy Section Registrar,

Having regard to:

the application (no. 5248/19) against Spain lodged with the Court under Article 34 of the Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms (“the Convention”) on 18 January 2019 by a Spanish company, Ares Chofer Canarias S.L.U., registered in 2014 in San Cristobal de la Laguna (Tenerife), (“the applicant”) who was represented by Mr F. Irurzun Montoro and Mr R. Garcia Tapia Gonzalez Camino, lawyers practising in Madrid;

the decision to give notice of the application to the Spanish Government (“the Government”), represented by their Agent, Mr. A. Brezmes Martínez de Villareal, State Attorney;

the parties’ observations;

Having deliberated, decides as follows:

SUBJECT-MATTER OF THE CASE

1. The applicant company initiated administrative proceedings requesting licenses to provide car-rental services with driver (‘VTC authorisations’) in the Canary Islands. On 11 September 2014 the Council ( Cabildo ) of Tenerife informed the applicant by a communication ( acto de trámite ) that the request could not be approved. The applicant requested judicial review of the said communication before Administrative judge no. 1 of Santa Cruz de Tenerife. The appeal did not concern the decision of 24 November 2014 of the Director of Transport and Mobility Service of the Cabildo which, in the meantime, had rejected the administrative appeal against the Cabildo decision.

2. By a judgment of 13 April 2016, Administrative judge no. 1 of Santa Cruz de Tenerife declared inadmissible the judicial appeal against the communication of 11 September 2014, considering that the applicant company had appealed against a mere informative communication and not against an administrative decision. The applicant company did not pursue any appeal against the administrative decision of 24 November 2014 nor extended the scope of the judicial appeal to include the decision. The applicant’s subsequent appeals were dismissed.

3. Relying on Article 6 § 1 of the Convention, the applicant company complained of an excessively formalistic approach of the domestic courts’ in declaring its appeal inadmissible, preventing its case from being examined on the merits.

THE COURT’S ASSESSMENT

4. The Government challenged the admissibility of the application on a number of grounds. The Court does not find it necessary to deal with these objections in details, in view of its analysis below.

5. Turning to the applicant’s argument of allegedly excessively formalistic approach blocking its right of access to court, the Court recalls that the observance of formalised rules of civil procedure, through which parties secure the determination of a civil dispute, is valuable and important as it is capable of limiting discretion, securing equality of arms, preventing arbitrariness, securing the effective determination of a dispute and adjudication within a reasonable time, and ensuring legal certainty and respect for the court (see Zubac v. Croatia [GC], no. 40160/12, § 96, 5 April 2018). The Court also takes into account whether the procedural errors could be avoided (ibid., § 94).

6. In the present case the applicant company chose not to either extend its judicial appeal to the administrative decision of 24 November 2014 nor to lodge a separate appeal of the said decision before the administrative judge. Instead, it insisted on challenging a mere communication of 11 September 2014. The inadmissibility of the judicial appeal presented by the applicant company was thus the result of an avoidable mistake at the time it was submitted. The decisions of the administrative courts have not amounted to a disproportionate hindrance of the applicant’s right of access to a court.

7. Having regard to the foregoing, the application must be rejected as being manifestly ill-founded according to Article 35 § 3 of the Convention.

For these reasons, the Court, unanimously,

Declares the application inadmissible.

Done in English and notified in writing on 18 November 2021.

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Olga Chernishova Darian Pavli Deputy Registrar President