Muchos granitos pequeños hacen un montón, y si es un sindicato quién defiende el montón, entonces la cuestión se revaloriza y convierte en cuestión de cuantía indeterminada, con lo que se abre el recurso de apelación frente a las sentencias dictadas por los Juzgados contencioso-administrativo. Este es el criterio novedoso y práctico fijado por la reciente sentencia de la Sala contencioso-administrativo del Tribunal Supremo de de 20 de noviembre de 2020 (rec.7960/2018). Con ello se colma una laguna del régimen de cuantía contencioso-administrativa y se potencia la posición procesal de los sindicatos.
En el caso concreto, el sindicato en nombre de sus afiliados se quejaba de la discriminación y pretendía el reconocimiento por la Administración autonómica extremeña del derecho de diez días de los funcionarios interinos como servicio activo (lo que abriría paso a un derecho retributivo correspondiente). Dado que el Juzgado contencioso-administrativo estimó el recurso pero la Sala contencioso-administrativa inadmitió el recurso de apelación por insuficiente cuantía (ya que el valor de diez días de retribuciones de cada interino no alcanzaba los 30.000 €), es la Junta de Extremadura la que formuló recurso de casación ante el Tribunal Supremo.
Así, la importante sentencia afronta la siguiente cuestión casacional:
si la cuantía a efectos procesales del objeto litigioso cuando la pretensión es formulada por un sindicato o cualquier entidad en representación de intereses colectivos, ha de determinarse en atención al conjunto de intereses colectivos que representa, o si procede cuantificarla de forma individualizada según el daño ocasionado a cada afiliado o representado o, en sí, si debe considerarse de cuantía indeterminada.
El fundamento acogido por la sentencia para resolver tal cuestión consiste en tener en cuenta que el sindicato vela por las condiciones de un colectivo, de manera que:
No hay en la norma legal, art. 42 LJCA, un trato específico para acciones ejercitadas por una organización sindical o cualquier otra entidad que represente intereses colectivos en que estén en juego derechos fundamentales como el de igualdad de trato.
Un supuesto como el de autos presenta, por tanto, la particularidad de que, independientemente de la cuantificación económica de la segunda pretensión, no clarificada en su exacta cuantía, está en discusión la aplicación o no del principio de igualdad de trato como eje principal y necesario para resolver aquella. De prosperar la invocación del principio de igualdad de trato, lo que aquí aconteció, se abre la vía para declarar los derechos económicos. En consecuencia, en las circunstancias del caso debemos entender que se trata de un recurso de cuantía indeterminada.
Por tanto fija la doctrina final.
cuando una organización sindical o cualquier otra entidad en representación de intereses colectivos formule una pretensión engarzada con principios o derechos fundamentales de la Constitución o del Derecho de la Unión Europea que se reclaman para un colectivo o conjunto, aunque también lleve aparejada una pretensión económica, prevalece la cuantía indeterminada de la primera pretensión.”
Nótese que son dos las condiciones para esta atribución de cuantía indeterminada: Que sea un sindicato o entidad representativa de intereses colectivos la demandante, y que la pretensión se ampare en principios o derechos fundamentales.
Es un buen paso hacia la tutela judicial efectiva pues permite que se afronten las cuestiones que afectan a colectivos, al margen de su cuantía, en doble instancia. El problema es que el recurso de un Quijote aislado a título propio, por una cuestión de pequeña cuantía no tendrá posibilidad de apelación, mientras que si lo asume un sindicato sí tendrá posibilidad de apelación, pues fácil será cargar la demanda con algún principio o derecho fundamental.
Queda sobre la mesa la posibilidad, que en el futuro se planteará, de que esta doctrina tenga su proyección fuera del empleo público, pues pueden existir otras «entidades en representación de intereses colectivos» que ejerzan acciones públicas o en defensa de intereses colectivos (medioambiente, urbanismo, consumo,etcétera) y que impugnen actos administrativos de pequeña cuantía pero de impacto masivo.
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Many small ones do a lot, and if it is a union that defends the lot, then the issue is of an undetermined amount and the appeal is opened against the sentences handed down by the contentious-administrative courts. That is the new and practical criterion set by the recent ruling of the contentious-administrative Chamber of the Supreme Court of November 20, 2020 (rec. 7960/2018). With this, a gap in the contentious-administrative amount regime is filled and the procedural position of the unions is strengthened. In the specific case, the union on behalf of its members complained of discrimination and sought recognition by the Extremadura Autonomous Administration of the ten-day right of interim officials as active duty (which would open the way to a corresponding remuneration right). Given that the contentious-administrative court upheld the appeal but did not offer the possibility of appeal because the value of ten days of remuneration for each interim did not reach € 30,000, it is the Junta de Extremadura that formulates an appeal. Thus, the important sentence faces the following appeal question: If the amount for procedural purposes of the object in dispute when the claim is made by a union or any entity representing collective interests, has to be determined based on the set of collective interests it represents, or if it is appropriate to quantify it individually according to the damage caused to each affiliate or represented or, in itself, if it should be considered of an undetermined amount. The basis accepted by the judgment to resolve this issue consists in taking into account that the union watches over the conditions of a group, so that: There is no in the legal norm, art. 42 LJCA, a specific treatment for actions brought by a trade union organization or any other entity that represents collective interests in which fundamental rights such as equal treatment are at stake. Therefore, a case such as the one at hand presents the peculiarity that, regardless of the economic quantification of the second claim, not clarified in its exact amount, the application or not of the principle of equal treatment as the main axis and necessary to solve that one. If the invocation of the principle of equal treatment is successful, what happened here, the way is opened to declare economic rights. Consequently, in the circumstances of the case, we must understand that it is a resource of undetermined amount. Therefore fix the final doctrine. When a trade union organization or any other entity representing collective interests makes a claim linked to principles or fundamental rights of the Constitution or the Law of the European Union that are claimed for a group or group, even if it also carries an economic claim, prevails the undetermined amount of the first claim. » Note that there are two conditions for this attribution of undetermined amount: That the plaintiff is a union or entity representing collective interests, and that the claim is protected by fundamental principles or rights. It is a good step towards effective judicial protection as it allows issues that affect groups to be addressed, regardless of their amount, in double instance. The problem is that the recourse of an isolated Quixote in his own capacity, for a small matter, will not have the possibility of appeal, while if a union assumes it, it will have the possibility of appeal, since it will be easy to load the demand with some principle or right fundamental. The possibility remains on the table, which will arise in the future, that this doctrine has its projection outside of public employment, as there may be other «entities representing collective interests» that exercise public actions or in defense of collective interests (environment , urban planning, consumption, etc.) and that challenge administrative acts of small amount but of massive impact.
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In line with the lucid comment of the indefatigable Diego Gómez to the novelty introduced by the Sentence of the contentious-administrative Chamber of the Supreme Court of November 26, 2020 (rec.4592 / 2019), which specifies the very important cassational question of how to proceed by the Contentious judge when the public lawyer in the oral hearing of the abbreviated procedure, provides an expert report, of which the individual’s lawyer has not had prior notice, some urgent reflections are imposed on the pragmatic consequences of this criterion. The Chamber faces the assumption, not infrequent, that the Administration in full oral hearing of the abbreviated procedure provides an expert report, leaving the plaintiff and the judge mired in surprise in the situation that the sentence draws: Of the three possible alternatives (rejecting the expert provided, admitting it and evaluating it without the possibility of requesting clarifications by the plaintiff or granting the latter a period to instruct and request such clarifications) » On these possibilities the Supreme Court chooses: we consider that the third is the only one that safeguards the right to defense, since either of the other two would seriously compromise it for either party. » This option is based on the commented sentence rejecting the supplementary application of article 337 that imposes the presentation five days in advance, on a general premise: 9.1. The legal provision according to which the answer to the demand in the abbreviated procedure is carried out orally in the act of the hearing implies that the defendant can in said procedure propose all the evidence that he tries to use to defend his claims, including -obviously- the expert evidence, without being able to condition the admission of said evidence to its presentation with a minimum notice before the hearing. And consequently fixes this general cassational doctrine: The general regulation of expert evidence, and the special characteristics of this means of evidence, require – also in cases in which such evidence is proposed in view of the abbreviated procedure – to grant the plaintiff the possibility of analyzing the expertise in order to request clarifications from the expert and make allegations to his conclusions, for which purpose – and whenever the plaintiff deems it necessary – the judicial body must grant said party a period that may not exceed five days to properly instruct of said test. 9.3. The specific period that must be granted for said instruction will be determined by the judge in view of the circumstances of the case, taking into account the content of the expert report, its apparent difficulty and the request in this regard made by the plaintiff and may determine, in his case, the suspension of the oral hearing and the practice of a new indication. 9.4. All this, leaving intact the powers of the judicial body to reject said evidence in the event that it considers it useless, impertinent or unnecessary, in which case it will not proceed to grant any term to the opposing party so that it can be instructed of the proposed evidence. Let’s take a closer look the day after at such a doctrine. The consequence is threefold: For the public lawyer, the possibility of surprising the party is opened, keeping his evidentiary aces until the final moment. For the plaintiff, it means leaving him in a technical inferiority plane, since now he will be able to formulate clarifications against the «enemy’s report» but he will not be able to provide reports or complementary expert counter-evidence of his own expertise to refute it. At the most, he may request a final diligence for the practice of a judicial expert, an exceptional and ex gratia measure by the judge. The judge will be obliged to grant this possibility of additional clarifications, promoted by the public lawyer and its imposition for the private lawyer inevitably. And worst of all, that there will be a postponement of the hearing, disturbing the schedule of complaints and distorting the good order of the proceedings. I believe that this judgment has the merit of establishing a clear position, at the service of procedural legal security, but there were other alternatives. I mean that I had the opportunity to face this problem after the entry into force of the LEC, as of the year 2000, when I realized as a judge that in the oral hearings there were no shortage of surprises, both from the private attorney and the public lawyer , that they poured on the table in the oral hearing the expertise of their interest, with the consequent problem, that it was materially impossible to enlighten, read and reflect on it in full oral hearing, which led to the necessary practice of offering the judge a alternative: either order the postponement of the hearing if the «surprised» party so requested, or order the granting of a period of written arguments without the need to resume the oral hearing. Given that at that time this solution seemed disturbing and unsatisfactory for all parties, turning the issue over, I adopted from the contentious-administrative court of Oviedo a solomonic solution and adjusted to the cleanliness of the rules of the game: I simply applied article 337 of the LEC additionally and on an analogical basis, which provides that in civil trials the parties will provide the expertise five days in advance of the oral hearing. But to avoid surprises on the part of the parties, I simply incorporated a simple stipulation as follows: “The parties are warned that if they wish to bring new or complementary skills to the oral hearing, they must be provided to the Court at least five days in advance to be able to illustrate the opposing party, in order to avoid any defenselessness , in supplementary application of art.337 LEC. If this is not done, the expertise provided extemporaneously will be inadmissible at the oral hearing ”. Said subsection clearly established the rules of the game for both parties, and since then they were provided with that advance. No problem in ten years of sentences in this way. At the end of the day, what public and private lawyers want is clarity in the rules of the game. What the legislator wants is an abbreviated trial in unity of act and what the judge wants is cleanliness and equal opportunities for the parties. However, now the Supreme Court opts for a theoretically impeccable solution (avoid defenselessness) and practically whitish (it causes imbalances between the parties and will promote strategies, especially by public lawyers). In fact, there will be no shortage of public lawyers who will reserve the contribution of their expertise until the oral hearing, but there will be no shortage of plaintiffs who, due to procedural symmetry, will avail themselves of the possibilities of this doctrine and will surprisingly provide a new expert report at the oral hearing, with the surprise, in this case, for the public lawyer. This without forgetting that knowing the reality of the world of the Courts is not without damn grace that from the time the lawsuit is filed and the Administration knows it, until the oral hearing, usually between three months and a year, on average , so it is not much to ask that the expertise be provided five days in advance of the scheduled hearing. To relax the cold procedural tone, and illustrate the problem mutatis mutandis, let me ask you a question for each of you to answer: Imagine that on your wedding day they come to say «Yes, I do», and when the priest asks his partner if he wishes to be his spouse, in a context of total solemnity in front of all the guests present, he responds: «If I would, but as long as he respects my habits of partying without giving explanations and that my snoring does not bother him because of the intensity of which I am undergoing treatment ”. What would you like? That the celebration be suspended in front of the entire public to resume another day, with all the assembly that involves That the outcome be put on hold, waiting for you to communicate your opinion to the priest in writing. That he had learned of these conditions at least five days before the celebration to be able to say his opinion in the sole and formal act. 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Muchos granitos pequeños hacen un montón, y si es un sindicato quién defiende el montón, entonces la cuestión se revaloriza y convierte en cuestión de cuantía indeterminada, con lo que se abre el recurso de apelación frente a las sentencias dictadas por los Juzgados contencioso-administrativo. Este es el criterio novedoso y práctico fijado por la reciente sentencia de la Sala contencioso-administrativo del Tribunal Supremo de de 20 de noviembre de 2020 (rec.7960/2018). Con ello se colma una laguna del régimen de cuantía contencioso-administrativa y se potencia la posición procesal de los sindicatos.
NOTA FINAL.- Hoy martes 15 de diciembre incluido, es el último día de PLAZO PARA PROPONER SUS CANDIDATURAS A LOS PREMIOS, BLOGS Y POST, Premios Blogs de Oro Jurídico 2020 Basta proponer candidaturas mediante un sencillo correo electrónico sin sus datos personales pero sí del blog o post que propone al correo: blogosjuridicos@gmail.com. Aquí están las Bases.
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