The Plea of Illegality as a Legal Remedy - Review of the Legality of EU Acts

The article presents the conditions and principles developed in the case-law of the Court of Justice of the European Union for raising the plea provided for in Article 277 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union (hereinafter TFEU or Treaty) for the review of the legality of acts of EU law. This objection commonly referred to in the legal writing as the plea of illegality allows challenging an act of general application which constitutes the basis for an individual act. This review may be carried out after the expiry of the (two-month) period provided for in Article 263 TFUE to declaration of acts of EU law as void, also by individual persons and entities that do not meet the conditions of the so-called Plaumann test. Unfortunately, this rule is subject to numerous limitations, especially in the view of the principle developed in case-law, according to which the admissibility of an plea of illegality depends on the prior submission of an action for annulment. The paper also analyses the conditions for the admissibility of raising the plea of illegality by Member States and EU institutions (so-called privileged applicants).