FIRST SECTION
CASE OF CIANCHELLA AND OTHERS v. ITALY
(Applications nos. 65808/13 and 2 others –
 see list in the appendix)
 
 
 
 
JUDGMENT
 
STRASBOURG
23 June 2022
 
 
 
This judgment is final but it may be subject to editorial revision. In the case of Cianchella and Others v. Italy,
The European Court of Human Rights (First Section), sitting as a Committee composed of:
 Péter Paczolay, President,
 Raffaele Sabato,
 Davor Derenčinović, judges,
and Liv Tigerstedt, Deputy Section Registrar,
Having regard to:
the applications (no. 65808/13, no. 58494/14 and no. 66370/14) against the Italian Republic lodged with the Court under Article 34 of the Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms (“the Convention”) by the applicants listed in the appended table, (“the applicants”), on the various dates indicated therein;
the decision to give notice of the applications to the Italian Government (“the Government”) represented by their former co-Agent, Ms P. Accardo;
the parties’ observations;
Having deliberated in private on 31 May 2022,
Delivers the following judgment, which was adopted on that date:
SUBJECT MATTER OF THE CASE
1. The case concerns legislative intervention in the course of ongoing civil proceedings. The applicants complained that the enactment of Law no. 296 of 27 December 2006 (“Law no. 296/2006”) had violated their right to a fair hearing under Article 6 § 1 of the Convention. 2. The circumstances of the case are analogous to those described in D’Amico v. Italy (no. 46586/14, 17 February 2022). 3. Following their spouses’ death, the applicants received a survivor’s pension calculated as 60% of the pension originally paid to their late husbands. The applicants brought proceedings against the Istituto Nazionale della Previdenza Sociale (“INPS”) and the Istituto Nazionale di Previdenza per i Dipendenti dell’Amministrazione Pubblica (“INPDAP”, whose functions, following its abolition in 2011, are currently carried out by the INPS), complaining that a special supplementary allowance (indennità integrativa speciale – “the IIS”) which formed part of their spouses’ pension should have been paid in its entirety, that is, as an ancillary allowance rather than as a percentage of the benefit originally paid. The applicants relied on the relevant laws applicable at the time their late husbands began to receive their pensions, according to which the pension paid to the survivor of a public-sector employee was calculated as a percentage of only the fixed salary element, and the ancillary allowances were paid in full. They considered that section 15(5) of Law no. 724/1994 had preserved arrangements already in place and, while Law no. 335/1995 had subsequently extended the rules governing survivors’ pensions to all forms of the general compulsory insurance scheme, the new system only applied to direct pensions which had been paid after 1 January 1995. 4. While those proceedings were pending before the Lazio Court of Auditors, Law no. 296/2006 entered into force. Section 1(774) of that Law provided an authentic interpretation of section 1(41) of Law no. 335/1995, establishing that, in instances where survivors’ pensions were received after the entry into force of Law no. 335/1995, regardless of the date of the payment of the direct pension, the IIS had to be paid as a percentage, forming an integral part of the main pension. Pursuant to the entry into force of Law no. 296/2006, the Lazio Court of Auditors dismissed the applicants’ claims. The decisions were upheld by the Central Section of the Court of Auditors. 5. Relying on Article 6 § 1 of the Convention, the applicants complained that the enactment of Law no. 296/2006, which departed from well-established case-law while the proceedings in their case were still pending, had violated their right to a fair hearing.

Outcome for Article 6: violation