Judgment — ECLI:EU:F:2007:208
Date: 2007-11-27
Language of the case: French
Court formation: First Chamber
Based on: Merger Treaty (1965)
Subject matter: Staff regulations and employment conditions - EC
Concepts: Sickness insurance
Procedure: Staff cases

Summary Officials – Social security – Sickness insurance – Scope ratione personae – Unmarried partner of an official (Staff Regulations, Art. 72; Annex VII, Arts 1(2)(c) and 2(4); Council Regulation No 723/2004; Rules on sickness insurance for officials of the European Communities, Art. 12) In order to define the term ‘unmarried partner of an official’ the text of Article 72 of the Staff Regulations, relating to the Joint Sickness Insurance Scheme of the European Communities, itself refers directly to the first three conditions of Article 1(2)(c) of Annex VII to the Staff Regulations, since the registration of the partnership, referred to in the introductory sentence of Article 1(2)(c) of Annex VII to the Staff Regulations, cannot be considered to be a prerequisite. If the legislature had wished to provide otherwise, Article 72 of the Staff Regulations and Article 12 of the Joint Rules on sickness insurance for officials of the European Communities would have referred respectively not to the ‘unmarried’ and ‘recognised’ partner of an official, but to his ‘registered’ partner, a term used in Article 1(2)(c) of Annex VII to the Staff Regulations. Moreover, recital 8 in the preamble to Council Regulation (EC, Euratom) No 723/2004 of 22 March 2004 amending the Staff Regulations of Officials of the European Communities and the Conditions of Employment of Other Servants of the European Communities, concerning the extension of the benefits enjoyed by married couples to forms of union other than marriage, refers to ‘[o]fficials in a non‑marital relationship recognised by a Member State as a stable partnership’, without making any mention of the conditions for the registration of the relationship in question. In that same context, there is, in essence, no difference between an unmarried partner of an official, as stated in Article 72 of the Staff Regulations, and a recognised partner of an official, within the meaning of Article 12 of the Joint Rules. Thus, in order to decide whether the right to be covered by the Joint Sickness Insurance Scheme should be extended to the unmarried partner of an official, the task of the Community judicature is to review whether the first three conditions only of Article 1(2)(c) of Annex VII to the Staff Regulations have been complied with . The first condition states that the couple are to produce a legal document recognised as such by a Member State, or any competent authority of a Member State, proving their status as non‑marital partners. That condition has three parts – the first part concerns the production of a ‘legal’ document regarding the status of the persons; – the second part adds the requirement that the legal document be ‘recognised’ as such by a Member State; – lastly, the third part requires that the legal document, concerning the status of the persons, acknowledge that the persons concerned have the status of ‘non‑marital partners’. The question whether two persons are ‘non-marital partners’ within the meaning of the third part cannot be solely a matter for the discretion of the national authorities of a Member State. Thus, the requirements to be met in order to attain the status of ‘non‑marital partners’ cannot be satisfied by the mere fact that an official document, recognised as such by a Member State, asserts that such a status exists . On the other hand, in order to fall within Article 72 of the Staff Regulations and Article 12 of the Joint Rules on sickness insurance for officials of the European Communities a partnership must have a certain resemblance to a marriage. It is in the light of that criterion that the third part of the first condition must be understood as comprising three cumulative sub‑conditions. First, the third part of that condition presupposes, and the term itself as used in the provisions of the Staff Regulations applicable confirms that interpretation, that the partners must form a ‘couple’, in other words a union of two persons, distinct from other unions of persons. Further, the use of the term ‘status’ shows that the partners’ relationship must have public and formal aspects. Linked in part to the first part of the first condition, concerning the production of a legal document regarding the status of the persons, the requirement that the persons concerned should have the status of non-marital partners goes however beyond the mere requirement of an ‘official’ document. Lastly, the term ‘non-marital partners’ must be understood as referring to a situation where the partners’ cohabitation is characterised by a certain stability and they are linked, during that cohabitation, by reciprocal rights and obligations, relating to their cohabitation. Such an interpretation is, moreover, consistent with developments in social attitudes. In that regard, extending the right to be covered by the Joint Sickness Insurance Scheme to the stable partner of an official pursues the objectives of solidarity and social cohesion, which differ from the objectives pursued by the provisions conferring on officials purely pecuniary advantages, in the form of additional salary such as, for example, the household allowance granted to the partner of an official, provided for by Article 1(2)(c) of Annex VII to the Staff Regulations; it is thus not unreasonable for stricter conditions regarding the relationship between the official and his unmarried partner to be applied to the grant of the last mentioned advantages than to the advantage consisting in the extension to that unmarried partner of the right to be covered by the Joint Sickness Insurance Scheme. (see paras 29-30, 32, 35-40, 49)