CONFERENCE „STATE AID” RISKS ASSOCIATED WITH THE EU CONTROL PRACTICAL ASPECTS AND CURRENT DEVELOPMENTS

Location: Hotel Marriott, Warszawa 15.06.2015

CONFERENCE

„STATE AID”

RISKS ASSOCIATED WITH THE EU CONTROL

PRACTICAL ASPECTS AND CURRENT DEVELOPMENTS

 “State aid” also known as “public aid” granted by the State to entrepreneur in a manner contradicting the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union (the ”TFUE”) has to be returned. This in turn can prompt further ramifications regarding the beneficiary itself, whose economic standing may be shaken, as well as other entities constituting the beneficiary’s business environment: its employees, customers, financing entities and others.

More importantly, in certain cases the beneficiary may not even realize the treat of being obliged to return the state aid. This can happen e.g. in case of European Commission having declared post factum certain measures of aid illegal (tax reliefs, subsidies and other forms of aid for specific industries or entrepreneurs).

Taking into account far-reaching consequences of declaring the granted state aid illegal, the ability to identify circumstances giving rise to such risk, the ability to prevent it and effectively participate in the proceedings carried out by the European Commission and the European courts, as well as to prove that the state aid was granted according to the European law, is of paramount importance.

The list of “state aid” or “public aid” measures, according to the art. 107(1) TFEU and the case law produced by the European Commission and the European courts, is not the limited one, thus it is subject to constant evolution as the European Commission initiates proceedings regarding yet unexplored situations. The recent developments in this respect demonstrate that the Commission can identify the state aid based on the combination of even unrelated measures, including tax measures, as well as declare on these grounds private law contracts null and void!

All-day-long conference will take off with introducing the guests to the basic requirements allowing the Commission to declare a particular measure as state aid according to the Article 107(1) TFEU. Afterwards, the conference will move on to cover specific provisions and their application in particular industries, as well as the issue of specific measures of state aid, such as tax aid. The Conference will be concluded with the discussion panel focused on the Polish perspective on the application of the state aid rules.

 Those who wish to participate in the conference have a unique opportunity to discover the perspective of the European Commission and its representatives on the matters covered during its course, as well as of the most prominent scholars of the leading European universities and practitioners with significant experience in pleading before the European Commission in the respective proceedings.

Issues being the subject of the conference should be of interest particularly for:

• entrepreneurs of both public and private sector, including entities cooperating with entrepreneurs operating in industries particularly vulnerable from the perspective of state aid laws, such as: railway, maritime and air transport, energy, mining, local governments, infrastructure etc.
•  financial institutions engaged in financing projects and entrepreneurs exposed to state aid risk
•  public and local administration
•  judges, tax professionals and in-house lawyers
•  board members, legal and compliance departments, public sector cooperation departments, regulatory and tax departments.

SPEAKERS:

Viktor Kreuschitz – Judge at the General Court of the European Union

Justyna Przekopiak – Director of the Local Taxes Department , Ministry of Finance

Prof Piet Jan Slot – Lecturer of European and commercial law at University of Leiden

Agnieszka Stobiecka –Kuik-  Member of the Legal Service, European Commission

PhD Jose Luis Buendia Sierra –  Partner, Garrigues Brussels

PhD Anna Jarosz – Friis –  Head of the Unit, State Aid Unit, Task Force Financial Crisis, European Commission,

Petra Nemeckova –  Legal service, European Commission

Katarzyna Herrmann –  Member of the Legal Service, State aid team, European Commission

Jose Manuel Panero Rivas –  Senior Associate, Garrigues, Bruksela

PhD Łukasz Grzejdziak –  Faculty of Law, University of Łódź

PhD Piotr Pełka –  Public Aid Monitoring Department, Office of Competition and Consumer Protection (OCCP), Poland

Prof Anna Fornalczyk –  Former OCCP President, Professor of Economics,  Partner at Comper

Adam Ambrozik – Adviser to the Minister, the Department of Restructuring and State Aid – Ministry of Treasury

Mateusz Przygodzki –  Head of Banking & Finance practice, Garrigues Warsaw

Michał Sobel -  Executive Vice President, Kompania Węglowa S.A.

Zbigniew Stopa – Chairman Of The Board, Lubelski Węgiel BOGDANKA S.A.

Agnieszka Radzimowska – Chief Specialist in the Office of Regulatory, PGE SA

Details of the conference:

• DOWNLOAD CONFERENCE PROGRAM

• DOWNLOAD APPLICATION

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