The applicant submits that he has not been permitted to take part in the next stage of the competition solely on the ground that the marks which he obtained in the test of comprehension and reasoning were insufficient, whereas his marks in the second test were amply sufficient.

He claims that the minimum marks required for both tests added up to 50, whilst the sum of the marks which he obtained amounted to 59.82, so that it may be inferred that his elimination was determined solely upon the basis of the test of comprehension and reasoning, in which he did not obtain the minimum required.

In this connection the applicant refers to his letter of 28 November 1982 in which he presented the Commission with his objections to a unilateral mode of evaluation of candidates, and he requests the Court to treat that letter as an integral part of his application.

In that letter, Mr Fabius laid particular stress on the fact that in order to have taken the second written test and obtained the sort of mark that was awarded to him, he must necessarily have been adept at comprehension and reasoning, and that that could not be determined by an intelligence test alone.

The applicant submits in conclusion that the decision at issue is contrary to equity and the principle of due care, because decisive importance was automatically attached to the only criterion of assessment provided, without any allowance being made for the possibility of a more thorough test on special grounds.

The applicant maintains that the disputed decision is contrary to the principle of due care inasmuch as decisive importance has been given to a test which is not sufficiently reliable to govern the admission of candidates.

In support of this point he submits a letter dated 26 November 1982 from the Rijks Psychologische Dienst [National Psychology Department] of the Netherlands, which shows, on the one hand, that intelligence tests cannot be considered a sufficiently reliable criterion of assessment, in particular because an individual's performance in examination conditions may be considerably worse than it would be in other conditions, and, on the other hand, that the National Psychology Department once came to an unfavourable opinion regarding the recruitment of the applicant in its national administration, and in spite of that his work has been found wholly satisfactory.

The applicant also submits letters from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and from the Ministry of the Interior of the Kingdom of the Netherlands, which show that the assessments of psychologists have no conclusive importance and that selection procedures based on them are considered with a certain amount of disquiet.

The applicant adds that in the Netherlands intelligence tests have not in the last few years been generally accorded such absolute value in recruitment for government service.

Finally, he argues that in the assessment of intelligence tests the findings of the Commission differ from results recorded in the Netherlands, which has therefore insisted that the procedure for recruitment and selection should be changed.

In these respects the applicant maintains that he has correctly interpreted the documents which he has annexed to his application.

Mr Fabius maintains that the contested decision is contrary to the principle of due care inasmuch as the Commission refused to undertake a more thorough inquiry into his capacities when it was informed of the fully-documented complaints which he submitted in his letter of 28 November 1982.

The Commission never expressed a view on the validity of the applicant's reasoning, either in the exchange of correspondence mentioned above, or in its defence.

that his present employer (Ministry of Transport, Water Control and Construction) is satisfied with his work, as was his previous employer (Ministry of Foreign Affairs) ;

that there are differences of opinion between the Commission and the Netherlands authorities with regard to the selection criteria for recruitment applied by the Commission.

The Commission recalls that, according to the case-law of the Court, it has wide discretionary powers in laying down all the rules governing competition (Case 90/74) Deboeck v Commission [1975] ECR 1123; Case 178/78 Szemerey v Commission [1979] ECR 2855).

Since the disputed provision in the notice of competition was clearly laid down in the interests of the service, the defendant did not exceed the limits of its discretion.

The Commission observes that the selection board complied with the rules laid down for the organization of the competition, so that no complaint can be levelled against it.

The Commission takes the view that the argument has no bearing on the case, in view of the fact that it appears from the notice of competition that the test of comprehension and reasoning was not the only eliminatory test and that by giving an eliminative effect to certain tests in the competition the Commission was within the limits of its discretion.

The Commission points out that the test entitled Comprehension and reasoning itself contained a number of questions (it consisted partly of a multi-choice test and partly of a constructive interpolation test), that the pass mark for that test was not very high and that the Commission has long relied on the battery of tests used in Competition No COM/A/325.

The Commission also considers that the documents submitted by the applicant in this connection have no relevance for this case, since the individuals or organizations which produced them could not have had enough information on the subject of the comprehension and reasoning test in Competition No COM/A/325, which moreover must not be assumed to be a psychological/technical test as the writers of the documents produced seem to suppose.

The Commission adds, in the alternative, that the documents produced by the applicant do not bear the construction that he places on them.

Finally, the Commission considers that in any event it enjoys a discretion as regards the choice of tests and the way in which the answers are to be marked.

The Commission points out that the selection board complied with the rules governing the competition and that it cannot be accused of not treating the applicant's case with the care required.

The selection board was not called upon to interpret the provision at issue in the notice of competition because that provision did not require any interpretation in view of the fact that its terms were clear.

Finally, the position adopted by the selection board was consistent with the principle of equality as between the various candidates in the competition.