Opinion of the Advocate General — ECLI:EU:C:1999:248
Date: 1999-05-18
Based on: Treaty establishing the European Economic Community (1957)
Subject matter: Social security for migrant workers
Procedure: Reference for a preliminary ruling
Origin: Belgium

Summary of the Judgment 
Social security for migrant workers — Benefits — National legislation to prevent 
overlapping — Where, in calculating pensions, the war years are taken into account in 
accordance with a presumption confined to periods not reckonable for the purposes of a 
pension under the scheme of another Member State — Such rules do not constitute 
'provisions on reduction, suspension or withdrawal' within the meaning of Regulation 
No 1408/71 
(Council Regulation No 1408/71, as amended by Regulation No 1248/92) 
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SUMMARY — CASE C-161/98 
The term 'provisions on reduction, suspen­
sion or withdrawal' within the meaning of 
Regulation No 1408/71, as amended by 
Regulation No 1248/92, does not cover 
national legislation — such as that esta­
blishing the Belgian 'war years presump­
tion' — under which an employed person 
who, between 1 January 1938 and 1 Jan­
uary 1945, was in employment in respect of 
which minimum contributions were paid 
under a social security scheme of the State 
concerned is deemed to have paid sufficient 
contributions to establish that he was 
normally and principally employed 
throughout the period between the date 
on which the period of employment estab­
lished came to an end and 1 January 1946, 
but under which that presumption is not 
applicable to periods of employment for 
which the person concerned receives a 
pension under a scheme of another State. 
In so far as a provision of that kind is part 
of legislation whose purpose is to reduce 
the damaging effects of the Second World 
War on the pension rights of workers 
subject to the legislation of the Member 
State concerned, it merely gives due effect 
to the fact that, for all or part of the periods 
of employment in respect of which the 
person concerned is not in a position to 
prove payment of sufficient social security 
contributions under the scheme in question, 
he is already receiving a pension under 
another scheme. 
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