Exclusion Grounds, Insufficient Self-cleaning and an Allegedly Abnormally Low Tender: Westpole Belgium v the European Parliament (T-640/22)

The most interesting parts of this judgment concern exclusion grounds. The General Court had to assess a situation where the self-cleaning conducted was not sufficient, and decide whether a tenderer’s failure to inform the contracting authority of on-going legal proceedings constituted misrepresentation of information concerning applicability of exclusion grounds, in a situation where no final judgment existed.
Of particular interest are the General Court’s conclusions that, in the context of procurement under the EU’s Financial Regulations, there is no obligation to disclose on-going procedures relating to exclusion grounds that had not yet resulted in a final judgment and that even when self-cleaning is not sufficient in itself to avoid exclusion automatically, it can be taken into account in the overall assessment of whether a tenderer should be excluded.