Baumbast and R v Secretary of State for the Home Department.
Date: 2002-09-17
31 The procedure provided for in Article 234 EC is an instrument of cooperation between the Court of Justice and national courts by means of which the former provides the latter with interpretation of such Community law as is necessary for them to give judgment in cases upon which they are called to adjudicate (see Case C-231/89 Gmurzynska-Bscher [1990] ECR I-4003, paragraph 18).
32 It follows that it is for the national courts alone which are seised of the case and are responsible for the judgment to be delivered to determine, in view of the special features of each case, both the need for a preliminary ruling in order to enable them to give their judgment and the relevance of the questions which they put to the Court.  Consequently, where the questions put by national courts concern the interpretation of a provision of Community law, the Court is, in principle, bound to give a ruling (see, inter alia, Gmurzynska-Bscher, paragraphs 19 and 20).
34 It would be otherwise only in cases where either it appears that the procedure of Article 234 EC has been misused and been resorted to, in fact, in order to elicit a ruling from the Court in the absence of a real dispute or it is obvious that the provisions of Community law submitted for the interpretation of the Court cannot apply, either directly or indirectly, to the circumstances of the case (see, to that effect, Gmurzynska-Bscher, paragraph 23, and Case C-130/95 Giloy [1997] ECR I-4291, paragraph 22).
50 In that respect, it must be borne in mind that the aim of Regulation No 1612/68, namely freedom of movement for workers, requires, for such freedom to be guaranteed in compliance with the principles of liberty and dignity, the best possible conditions for the integration of the Community worker's family in the society of the host Member State (see Case C-308/89 Di Leo [1990] ECR I-4185, paragraph 13).
51 As the Court pointed out in paragraph 21 of Echternach and Moritz, for such integration to come about, a child of a Community worker must have the possibility of going to school and pursuing further education in the host Member State, as is expressly provided in Article 12 of Regulation No 1612/68, in order to be able to complete that education successfully.
52 In circumstances such as those in the Baumbast case, to prevent a child of a citizen of the Union from continuing his education in the host Member State by refusing him permission to remain might dissuade that citizen from exercising the rights to freedom of movement laid down in Article 39 EC and would therefore create an obstacle to the effective exercise of the freedom thus guaranteed by the EC Treaty.
53 Although the Court found in Echternach and Moritz that the child concerned could not, after his father's return to his Member State of origin, continue his studies there because there is no coordination of school diplomas, it is none the less the case that the Court's reasoning sought essentially to ensure, in accordance with the aim of integration of members of the families of migrant workers pursued by Regulation No 1612/68, that a child of one of those workers could go to school and pursue further education in the host Member State, under conditions which do not constitute discrimination, in order to be able to complete that education successfully (see, also, Case 42/87 Commission v Belgium [1988] ECR 5445, paragraph 10).
54 In fact, to permit children of a citizen of the Union who are in a situation such as that of Mr Baumbast's children to continue their education in the host Member State only where they cannot do so in their Member State of origin would offend not only the letter of Article 12 of Regulation No 1612/68, which provides a right of access to educational courses for the children of a national of a Member State `who is or has been employed' in the territory of another Member State, but also its spirit.
55 Consequently, the restrictive interpretation of that provision proposed by the German Government cannot be accepted.
56 As to whether the fact that the children are not themselves citizens of the Union can affect the answer to the first question, suffice it to state that, under Article 10 of Regulation No 1612/68, the descendants of a Community worker who are under the age of 21 or are dependants, irrespective of their nationality, are to be regarded as members of his family and have the right to install themselves with that worker and that, accordingly, they have the right to be admitted to the school system in accordance with Article 12 of that regulation.
57 Furthermore, the right of `his spouse and their descendants who are under the age of 21 years or are dependants' to install themselves with the migrant worker must be interpreted as meaning that it is granted both to the descendants of that worker and to those of his spouse. To give a restrictive interpretation to that provision to the effect that only the children common to the migrant worker and his spouse have the right to install themselves with them would run counter to the aim of Regulation No 1612/68 noted above.
58 As regards, second, the R case, the children concerned enjoy, as members of the family of a worker who is a national of one Member State and who is employed in the territory of another Member State, a right of residence and a right to pursue their education under Articles 10 and 12 of Regulation No 1612/68.
59 As is apparent from paragraph 50 above, those provisions seek to facilitate the integration of the migrant worker and his family in the host Member State in order to attain the objective of Regulation No 1612/68, namely freedom of movement for workers, in compliance with the principles of liberty and dignity.
60 Even though R and her first husband have meanwhile divorced, it is apparent from the file that he continues to pursue an activity as an employed person in the United Kingdom and therefore enjoys the status of a worker who is a national of one Member State and who is employed in the territory of another Member State for the purposes of Articles 1 and 10 of Regulation No 1612/68.
61 Under those circumstances, it follows clearly from the provisions of Regulation No 1612/68, in particular Articles 10 and 12 thereof, that the children of R's first husband continue to enjoy a right to reside in the host Member State as well as the right to pursue their education there under the same conditions as the nationals of that State.
62 The fact that the children of R's first husband do not live permanently with him does not affect the rights which they derive from Articles 10 and 12 of Regulation No 1612/68.  In providing that a member of a migrant worker's family has the right to install himself with the worker, Article 10 of that regulation does not require that the member of the family in question must live permanently with the worker, but, as is clear from Article 10(3), only that the accommodation which the worker has available must be such as may be considered normal for the purpose of accommodating his family (see Case 267/83 Diatta [1985] ECR 567, paragraph 18).
63 In the light of the foregoing, the answer to the first question must be that children of a citizen of the European Union who have installed themselves in a Member State during the exercise by their parent of rights of residence as a migrant worker in that Member State are entitled to reside there in order to attend general educational courses there, pursuant to Article 12 of Regulation No 1612/68. The fact that the parents of the children concerned have meanwhile divorced, the fact that only one parent is a citizen of the Union and that parent has ceased to be a migrant worker in the host Member State and the fact that the children are not themselves citizens of the Union are irrelevant in this regard.
The second question
68 First, Article 12 of Regulation No 1612/68 and the rights which flow from it must be interpreted in the context of the structure and purpose of that regulation. It is apparent from the provisions of the regulation, taken as a whole, that in order to facilitate the movement of members of workers' families the Council took into account, first, the importance for the worker, from a human point of view, of having his entire family with him and, secondly, the importance, from all points of view, of the integration of the worker and his family into the host Member State without any difference in treatment in relation to nationals of that State (see, to that effect, Case 249/86 Commission v Germany [1989] ECR 1263, paragraph 11).
69 As is clear from the answer to the first question, Article 12 of Regulation No 1612/68 seeks in particular to ensure that children of a Community worker can, even if he has ceased to pursue the activity of an employed person in the host Member State, undertake and, where appropriate, complete their education in that Member State.
70 Second, according to the case-law of the Court, just like the status of migrant worker itself, the rights enjoyed by members of a Community worker's family under Regulation No 1612/68 can, in certain circumstances, continue to exist even after the employment relationship has ended (see, to that effect, Echternach and Moritz, paragraph 21, and Case C-85/96 Martínez Sala [1998] ECR I-2691, paragraph 32).
71 In circumstances such as those of the main proceedings, where the children enjoy, under Article 12 of Regulation No 1612/68, the right to continue their education in the host Member State although the parents who are their carers are at risk of losing their rights of residence as a result, in one case, of a divorce from the migrant worker and, in the other case, of the fact that the parent who pursued the activity of an employed person in the host Member State as a migrant worker has ceased to work there, it is clear that if those parents were refused the right to remain in the host Member State during the period of their children's education that might deprive those children of a right which is granted to them by the Community legislature.
72 Moreover, in accordance with the case-law of the Court, Regulation No 1612/68 must be interpreted in the light of the requirement of respect for family life laid down in Article 8 of the European Convention.  That requirement is one of the fundamental rights which, according to settled case-law, are recognised by Community law (see Commission v Germany, cited above, paragraph 10).
73 The right conferred by Article 12 of Regulation No 1612/68 on the child of a migrant worker to pursue, under the best possible conditions, his education in the host Member State necessarily implies that that child has the right to be accompanied by the person who is his primary carer and, accordingly, that that person is able to reside with him in that Member State during his studies.  To refuse to grant permission to remain to a parent who is the primary carer of the child exercising his right to pursue his studies in the host Member State infringes that right.
74 As to the Commission's argument to the effect that a right of residence cannot be derived from Article 12 of Regulation No 1612/68 in favour of a person who is not the child of a migrant worker, on the ground that possession of that status is a sine qua non of any right under that provision, having regard to its context and the objectives pursued by Regulation No 1612/68 and in particular Article 12 thereof, that provision cannot be interpreted restrictively (see, to that effect, Diatta, paragraph 17) and must not, under any circumstances, be rendered ineffective.
75 In the light of the foregoing, the answer to the second question must be that where children have the right to reside in a host Member State in order to attend general educational courses pursuant to Article 12 of Regulation No 1612/68, that provision must be interpreted as entitling the parent who is the primary carer of those children, irrespective of his nationality, to reside with them in order to facilitate the exercise of that right notwithstanding the fact that the parents have meanwhile divorced or that the parent who has the status of citizen of the European Union has ceased to be a migrant worker in the host Member State.
The third question
80 According to settled case-law, the right of nationals of one Member State to enter the territory of another Member State and to reside there constitutes a right conferred directly by the EC Treaty or, depending on the case, by the provisions adopted to implement it (see, inter alia, Case 48/75 Royer [1976] ECR 497, paragraph 31).
81 Although, before the Treaty on European Union entered into force, the Court had held that that right of residence, conferred directly by the EC Treaty, was subject to the condition that the person concerned was carrying on an economic activity within the meaning of Articles 48, 52 or 59 of the EC Treaty (now, after amendment, Articles 39 EC, 43 EC and 49 EC) (see Case C-363/89 Roux [1991] ECR I-273, paragraph 9), it is none the less the case that, since then, Union citizenship has been introduced into the EC Treaty and Article 18(1) EC has conferred a right, for every citizen, to move and reside freely within the territory of the Member States.
82 Under Article 17(1) EC, every person holding the nationality of a Member State is to be a citizen of the Union.  Union citizenship is destined to be the fundamental status of nationals of the Member States (see, to that effect, Case C-184/99 Grzelczyk [2001] ECR I-6193, paragraph 31).
84 As regards, in particular, the right to reside within the territory of the Member States under Article 18(1) EC, that right is conferred directly on every citizen of the Union by a clear and precise provision of the EC Treaty. Purely as a national of a Member State, and consequently a citizen of the Union, Mr Baumbast therefore has the right to rely on Article 18(1) EC.
85 Admittedly, that right for citizens of the Union to reside within the territory of another Member State is conferred subject to the limitations and conditions laid down by the EC Treaty and by the measures adopted to give it effect.
86 However, the application of the limitations and conditions acknowledged in Article 18(1) EC in respect of the exercise of that right of residence is subject to judicial review.  Consequently, any limitations and conditions imposed on that right do not prevent the provisions of Article 18(1) EC from conferring on individuals rights which are enforceable by them and which the national courts must protect (see, to that effect, Case 41/74 Van Duyn [1974] ECR 1337, paragraph 7).
90 In any event, the limitations and conditions which are referred to in Article 18 EC and laid down by Directive 90/364 are based on the idea that the exercise of the right of residence of citizens of the Union can be subordinated to the legitimate interests of the Member States.  In that regard, according to the fourth recital in the preamble to Directive 90/364 beneficiaries of the right of residence must not become an `unreasonable' burden on the public finances of the host Member State.
91 However, those limitations and conditions must be applied in compliance with the limits imposed by Community law and in accordance with the general principles of that law, in particular the principle of proportionality.  That means that national measures adopted on that subject must be necessary and appropriate to attain the objective pursued (see, to that effect, Joined Cases C-259/91, C-331/91 and C-332/91 Alluè and Others [1993] ECR I-4309, paragraph 15).