The firm

Experience: the matters handled

The firm has practised in Italian public and administrative law since 1998. This page sets out the types of disputes and proceedings it handles and the courts before which it appears. The firm acts for businesses, individuals and professionals in their dealings with public authorities. Out of professional confidentiality, neither clients nor the outcomes of individual cases are named.

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Businesses

Disputes arising from dealings with public authorities

  • Tenders and public contracts: participation, exclusions and admissions, awards, abnormally low tenders, access to tender documents, contract performance, variations and claims, arbitration.
  • Concessions and public-private partnership: service and works concessions, project finance, revocation and withdrawal, indemnity.
  • Anti-mafia documentation: interdiction measures, hearings before the Prefecture, judicial supervision, collaborative prevention measures, applications for review.
  • Authorisations and permits: retail licences, public security licences, public grants and funding, energy, waste and environment.
  • Maritime state property: awards and comparative procedures, extensions, forfeitures, fees, dealings with Port System Authorities.

Individuals and professionals

Matters affecting the individual

  • Public competitions: exclusions, assessment of qualifications and papers, composition of boards, rankings and their use to fill posts.
  • Healthcare public employment: National Health Service competitions and calls, appointments, career progression, access to specialist training.
  • Academic careers: university competitions and national scientific qualification proceedings, for the period they were in force.
  • Planning and property: building permits and refusals, demolition orders, landscape and heritage constraints, expropriation.
  • Disciplinary liability: proceedings against lawyers, judges, notaries and members of professional bodies.

Candidates and electoral lists

Electoral litigation and the professions

  • Regional, provincial and municipal elections: admission and exclusion of lists and candidates, voting and counting operations, declaration of results, challenges before the administrative courts.
  • Disciplinary liability: proceedings against lawyers, judges, notaries and members of professional bodies.
  • Professional bodies: decisions on registration, removal and suspension, and challenges to resolutions affecting the practice of a profession.

Liability

Accounting and civil proceedings

  • Liability to the public purse: pre-trial notice, proceedings before the judicial divisions of the Court of Auditors, appeal.
  • Account proceedings and matters concerning accounting officers.
  • Civil liability and compensation for wrongful damage, including in dealings with public authorities.

Where the firm appears

The courts

The firm appears before the Regional Administrative Courts (TAR), the Council of State and the Sicilian Council of Administrative Justice, before the judicial divisions of the Court of Auditors and its appeal divisions, before the ordinary courts and Courts of Appeal in civil proceedings, and before the Court of Cassation, to whose special roll Prof. Toscano has been admitted since 2010. The firm also handles extraordinary petitions and applications to the European Court of Human Rights.

The firm is based in Catania. Administrative proceedings in Italy are entirely electronic and hearings may be held remotely, so the firm appears before administrative courts throughout Italy, attending in person where the hearing requires it.

How the firm works

Method

Every matter begins with checking the time limits and examining the decision, continues with access to documents where the reasons refer to material not disclosed, and is settled by an explicit assessment of what can realistically be achieved. Where a challenge is not worth bringing, the firm says so.

A lawyer's obligation is one of means, not of result: no prediction about the outcome of a case can be guaranteed. A written estimate is provided before the engagement, setting out expenses, disbursements and fees separately.

The information on this page is general in nature and does not constitute legal advice on any specific case.