Judgment — ECLI:EU:T:2003:21
Date: 2003-01-30
Language of the case: French
Court formation: Fourth Chamber, Extended Composition
Based on: Merger Treaty (1965)
Subject matter: Staff regulations and employment conditions - EC
Concepts: Survivor's pension
Procedure: Staff cases - successful

SUMMARY - CASE T-307/00 
Summary 
Officials - Pensions - Survivors ' pension - Orphan 's pension awarded to an 
official's child in the event of the death of a spouse who was not employed by the 
Communities - Pension refused because the deceased parent was not a spouse, 
despite established filiation and involvement in the child's maintenance - Breach 
of the principle of equal treatment - Unlawful 
(Staff Regulations, Art. 80, fourth para.) 
The principle of equal treatment is one of the fundamental principles of Community 
law and is breached where two classes of persons, whose factual or legal situations 
are not essentially different, are treated differently. That principle therefore requires 
that comparable situations should not be treated differently unless such 
differentiation is objectively justified. To be permissible, differentiation must be 
justified on the basis of objective and reasonable criteria and must be proportionate 
to the aim pursued. 
Since the purpose of the fourth paragraph of Article 80 of the Staff Regulations, 
relating to the award of an orphan's pension, is to compensate for the additional 
child maintenance cost incurred by an official as a result of the death of a person 
deemed to contribute, while alive, to that maintenance, the situation of an unmarried 
official whose child has lost his other parent, who was neither an official nor a 
member of the temporary staff and who actually contributed to the child's 
maintenance on the basis of a statutory obligation arising from acknowledgement of 
filiation, is comparable to those falling within the scope of that article. 
I-A - 34 
C v COMMISSION 
As regards possible justification for excluding unmarried officials from the scope 
of the fourth paragraph of Article 80 of the Staff Regulations, it should be pointed 
out that, in requiring the deceased person to have been, at the time of death, the 
official's 'spouse', the article is pursuing a legitimate aim in so far as it provides for 
the benefit in question to apply to situations generally corresponding to the loss, by 
the official and his child, of a material contribution to the latter's maintenance. 
However, to the extent that the application of that requirement excludes enjoyment 
of the entitlement in question where a material contribution to the maintenance of 
an unmarried official's child was actually provided by the deceased person in 
accordance with a statutory obligation arising from that person's acknowledgement 
of the child, the requirement is not reasonable. As the situation in society now 
stands, that requirement is not appropriate for identifying the actual additional cost 
that is deemed to be borne by the official in the maintenance of his child. If the 
fourth paragraph of Article 80 of the Staff Regulations assumes that the official is 
deemed to bear an additional cost in the event of the death of his spouse, it should 
assume that that additional cost would also arise in the event of the death of the 
other parent who was not the official's spouse, but who had recognised the child and 
was therefore legally obliged to maintain it. To the extent that it does not cover such 
a situation, the requirement adopted by the fourth paragraph of Article 80 of the 
Staff Regulations is not proportionate to the aim pursued, which is to limit the 
award of the benefit to situations generally corresponding to the loss, for the 
official, of a contribution to the maintenance of his child. 
In applying an unjustified differentiation and breaching the principle of equal 
treatment, the fourth paragraph of Article 80 of the Staff Regulations may not be 
taken as a basis for refusing to award an orphan's pension to an official's child in 
the event of the death of the other parent who, while not the official's spouse, 
nevertheless contributed to the child's maintenance on the basis of a statutory 
obligation arising from recognition of filiation. 
(see paras 48, 49. 53-56) 
See: 117/76 and 16/77 Ruckdeschel and Others [1977] ECR 1753. para. 7; C-479/93 
Francovich [19951 ECR I-3843. para. 23: T-8/93 Huet v Court of Auditors [1994] ECR 
I-A - 35 
SUMMARY — CASE T-307/00 
II-103, para. 45; T-146/96 De Abreu v Court of Justice [1998] ECR-SC I-A-109 and 
II-281, para. 53, and the case-law cited 
I-A - 36