April 2025 at the Court of Justice of the European Union – Update

In January 2025, AG J. Richard de la Tour delivered his opinion in case C-536/23, Mutua Madrileña Automovilista, upon a request from the Landgericht München I (Regional Court of Munich I, Germany) asking the Court of Justice :

Must Article 13(2) of Regulation (EU) No 1215/2012 [the Brussels I bis Regulation], read in conjunction with Article 11(1)(b) of that regulation, be interpreted as meaning that a Member State of the European Union itself, in its capacity as an employer which has continued to pay the remuneration of its official who has (temporarily) become unfit for work as a result of a road traffic accident and which is subrogated to the official’s rights vis-à-vis the company, established in another Member State, that provides the civil liability insurance for the vehicle involved in that accident, may sue the insurance company as an ‘injured party’ within the meaning of that provision before the courts for the place where the official who is unfit for work is domiciled, where a direct action is permitted?

The opinion invites the Court of Justice to answer that Article 13(2) of the Brussels I bis Regulation, read in conjunction with Article 11(1)(b) of that regulation,

must be interpreted as meaning that a Member State, acting in its capacity as the employer to which the rights of the official injured in a road traffic accident have passed and for whom it continued to pay his or her salary may, as the ‘injured party’, sue the company insuring the civil liability resulting from the vehicle involved in that accident, which is established in another Member State, in the courts for the place where the administrative body employing that official has its registered office.

The judgment is expected on 30 April 2025. A previous post on this blog provides a short description of the dispute on the merits.