80 proceed on the basis that the Commissioner/DPC will do so. If, having considered any submissions which FBI may make, the DPC proceeds to make a decision, or rather a “draft decision” for the purposes of Article 60, which FBI contends is wrong in law (and possibly wrong in fact on the basis of the case law referred to at para. 59 of FBI’s written submissions, on which I express no concluded view in this judgment), it will be open to FBI to commence fresh proceedings in respect of that decision. 164.
In conclusion, I am satisfied that at the time the inquiry was commenced by means of
the PDD the DPC was in possession of a vast amount of information by reason of its involvement and the involvement of its predecessor dating back to Mr. Schrems’ original complaint in 2013, that further investigations were conducted prior to the DPC’s decision to commence the inquiry by issuing the PDD, that its investigations are continuing, that FBI was and is entitled to make submissions on all relevant matters of fact and law and on any other matter it considers relevant, and that the Commissioner/DPC will consider those submissions before reaching her/its decision in the form of the “draft decision” to be submitted to the Article 60 procedure. I am satisfied that the DPC had not reached a decision or drawn conclusions in the inquiry at the time the PDD was issued. Therefore, I reject this ground of challenge advanced by FBI. 14. Alleged Departure by DPC from Published Procedures/Breach of Legitimate Expectation (a) Summary of the Parties’ Positions (1) FBI 165.
FBI contends that the procedure adopted by the DPC for the own-volition inquiry
notified to FBI and described in the PDD and in the surrounding correspondence differs significantly from the procedures which were published by the DPC in the DPC’s Annual Report for the period 25th May, 2018 to 31st December, 2018 (the “2018 Annual Report”) and
