the EU condemns France for its refusal to help a family who entered illegally

In a judgment delivered Thursday, December 19, the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) condemned France and ruled in favor of a family of three children of Armenian origin, who had demanded since 2014 to receive family allowances. The CAF of Hauts-de-Seine had refused to pay him these social benefits, on the grounds that the father had not been able to prove that each of his children had legally entered French soil. And for good reason: the man arrived illegally in France in 2008 with his wife and his first two children. Only the third, born in 2011, had been in a regular situation since his birth.

But the father has in the meantime obtained his situation regularized, since in 2014 he benefited from a temporary residence permit allowing him to work. If his entry onto French soil had been clandestine, his situation and that of his family were thus regularized when he requested to receive family allowances. He therefore won his case at first instance before the administrative judge, then lost on appeal. This judgment was annulled by the Court of Cassation and sent back to the Court of Appeal, which has since referred the matter to the European Union.

Requirements “contrary to Union law”

In its judgment, the CJEU therefore rules in favor of the father of the family and against the French administration by considering “contrary to Union law” of “subordinate the right to family benefits of third-country nationals legally residing in France to an additional condition, consisting of having to prove legal entry into French territory” of their children. The CJEU specifies that such a condition would amount to “reserve less favorable treatment for third-country nationals than that enjoyed by nationals of the host Member State”.

European justice thus affirms that Member States must “ensure equal treatment between workers [étrangers] residing in their territory and their national nationals”.

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It does not matter, therefore, whether or not a family has entered a European state regularly or not to find out if they can benefit from social assistance in that state.

This decision caused several right-wing political figures to react, including David Lisnard who considered that an “ultraminority of crazy people imposes its whims on us”, or Laurent Wauquiez who saw “a new example of the coup d’état of the supreme courts”assuring that he wants “put an end to this powerlessness to regain control over our migration policy”.

The president of the LR group in the National Assembly was taken over by public law teacher Nicolas Hervieu on Twitter, who objected that this decision “is only the application of a passed European law, not the whim of a judge”.