5.

That, however, does not mean, in addition, that the German administrative authorities and courts are free to disregard the content of foreign certificates or that the procedure prescribed for dealing with such certificates, as described in the order for reference, must be deemed to be compatible with Community law. Far from it, as I shall explain below. The plaintiff in the main proceedings has exercised a freedom guaranteed by the Treaty, namely to work as an employed person in another Member State, as a result of which she is entitled to claim social security benefits in that State. The question of status in issue before the national court concerning her date of birth involves a de facto prerequisite for the exercise of that right. It is true that ‘in the absence of any relevant Community rules, it is for the national legal order of each Member State to ... lay down the procedural rules for proceedings designed to ensure the protection of the rights which individuals acquire through the direct effect of Community law ...’. ( 2 ) However, that principle of ‘procedural autonomy’ is circumscribed by the requirement, emphasized by the Court of Justice on several occasions, that the procedural rules laid down by the competent State must not make it ‘impossible in practice to exercise’ the right conferred by Community law. ( 3 ) And it is specifically in the light of that requirement that the present case falls to be examined. What rules of evidence does the national court consider it has to apply here? It cites a rule of case-law under which, if two documents of differing dates are inconsistent with one another, it is the one which is closest in time to the event to be proved which prevails. It is in application of that rule that the national court considers that it has to attach greater probative value to Mrs Dafeki's old identity card than to the new birth certificate issued to her following a judicial decision rectifying her date of birth. Since the document resulting from that rectification is obviously of later date than the document that was rectified, Mrs Dafeki is precluded from proving the alteration in status, which, in turn, constitutes an indispensable prerequisite for asserting the right to receive the pension guaranteed to her under Community law. Furthermore, and quite apart the abovementioned rule of case-law, the German authorities' refusal to take account of the certificates submitted by Mrs Dafeki means that it is in practice impossible for her to be awarded the pension. She has to prove that she has reached the age of sixty, and I fail to see how she can do this other than by relying on the documents issued by her country of birth. After all, it cannot be said that Mrs Dafeki has not made every effort to provide proof of her age: she submitted to the court the new birth certificate issued by the competent authorities of her country of origin together with the court order constituting the authority for the rectification. Were any further condition to be imposed, it would, in my view, be either impossible or at least extremely difficult to meet. It would therefore be impermissible under the abovementioned case-law. In essence, I consider that the rules of evidence that the national court intends applying in this case make it impossible in practice to prove a fact which is a necessary prerequisite for the exercise of the right in question. Those rules must therefore be disapplied by the national court.