Dear Mr. L.,
On 10 February 1997 you made a complaint to the Regional Ombudsman of Rheinland Pfalz on behalf of AIDS-Hilfe Trier e.V. against the European Commission. As it was not within the mandate of the Regional Ombudsman, it was forwarded to me on 25 February 1997. Your complaint concerned the refusal of your application for funding by the European Commission.
On 21 May 1997, I forwarded the complaint to the President of the European Commission. The Commission sent its opinion on 29 August 1997 and I forwarded it to you with an invitation to make observations, which you sent on 17 November 1997.
I am writing now to let you know the results of the inquiries that have been made. I apologise for the length of time it has taken to deal with your complaint.

THE COMPLAINT

The background to the complaint is in summary the following:
The complainant is a German anti-AIDS organisation. It had sent four projects for funding to the European Commission. The complainant's projects were rejected by the Commission on the grounds that priority was given to large-scale projects. The complainant protested and claimed that this element was not mentioned in the documents provided for applicants.
Against this background, the complainant lodged the complaint with the European Ombudsman. It alleged that the Commission had not sufficiently informed it about the selection criteria.

THE INQUIRY

The Commission's opinion
In its opinion, the Commission has in substance stated the following:
By decision 647/96/EC of 29 March 1996, the European Parliament and the Council adopted a programme of Community action on the prevention of AIDS and certain other communicable diseases with the framework for action in the field of public health(1). According to Article 5, the Commission, supported by a Committee of representatives from the Member States, shall submit a draft of the measures to be taken concerning:

( c ) the arrangements, criteria and procedures for selecting and financing projects under this programme.

The selection criteria were as follows: priority is given to large-scale projects and methodically convincing programmes, which can assist in reaching the goals of the programmes.
The projects which were submitted by the complainant did not meet the criteria as regards scale and European perspective.
Furthermore, the allegedly unknown criterion was stated on page 19 of the application for funding which was signed by the complainant. The Commission was therefore of the opinion that, after thorough assessment, the complainant was sufficiently aware of this application criterion for the project.
The complainant's observations
In its observations, the complainant admitted that the criterion of priority given to large scale projects was mentioned in the documents sent by the Commission.
The complainant insisted though that this criterion was not clearly defined and it therefore had to rely on its experiences with a previous application procedure in 1995 where the criterion of priority for large scale projects was also mentioned. In 1995, the complainant had successfully submitted a similarly sized project to the Commission. The complainant put forward that its current projects should therefore not have been rejected.

THE DECISION

1. Article 5 of decision 647/96/EC provides that the Commission shall take the necessary measures concerning the arrangements, criteria and procedures for selecting and financing projects under this programme. One of the criteria was that priority was given to large scale projects.
It appears from the information given to the Ombudsman, that this criterion was communicated to the applicants by the Commission. The complainant did not dispute this fact in its observations.
2. A second element, which the complainant only mentioned in its observations, referred to a project which it successfully submitted to the Commission for funding in 1995. This project was of the same scale as the rejected projects. The complainant therefore argued that it should have received funding for its recent projects as they were of the same scale.
As the objection was put forward at a late stage and the Ombudsman did not have precise information on it, the matter could not be pursued any further.
The criterion of priority given to large scale projects was not the only selection criterion. After thorough assessment, there appears to be no element to conclude that the Commission wrongly assessed the applications for funding.
On the basis of the European Ombudsman's inquiries into this complaint, there appears to have been no maladministration by the Commission. The Ombudsman has therefore decided to close the case.
The President of the European Commission will also be informed of this decision.
Yours sincerely
Jacob Söderman

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(1) OJ 1996 L 95/16.