In a recent ruling, the CJEU stated that where one member of a consortium has told an untruth, the OTHER members are NOT LIABLE. Provided that they did not know about the lie.
The case concerned a tender for waste collection announced by a Lithuanian municipality. The winner turned out to be a consortium of four companies, but its competitor tried to prove in court that the CONSORTIUM DID NOT FULFILL THE TENDER CONDITIONS.
Doubts were raised by the statement of one of its members, who was the only one to meet the contracting authority’s requirement of achieving an average annual turnover of at least EUR 200,000 in mixed municipal waste collection and transport.
The Luxembourg Court held that the CONSORTIUM MEMBERS ARE NOT RESPONSIBLE FOR THE INFORMATION PROVIDED BY THE OTHER MEMBERS. Unless they were aware that it was false.
This, in turn, means that the contracting authority must assess the consortium members’ conduct individually, without extending their negligence to the entire entity. In addition, the contracting authority should always apply the self-decontamination procedure in such circumstances.