Published on 20 March 2023
SECOND SECTION
Application no. 47682/21
Nikolina GRŽEVIĆ
against Croatia
lodged on 17 September 2021
communicated on 1 March 2023
SUBJECT MATTER OF THE CASE
The application concerns the termination of the applicant’s disability allowance on account of interests accrued on an amount of money she had received as damages and deposited in a bank.
As a result of severe injuries suffered in a car accident in 2007, the applicant is fully physically disabled and in a permanent vegetative state. She is cared for by her parents. In 2008 she began receiving a disability allowance in the amount of 1,250 Croatian kunas (HRK; approximately 165 euros (EUR)) per month. She also concluded an out-of-court settlement with an insurance company for the non-pecuniary damage sustained in the accident, which was deposited on her bank account. According to the applicant, her amounts of disability allowance had been deducted from the damages received and it was the competent Social Welfare Centre which had advised that her damages be deposited.
In 2014 the competent Social Welfare Centre reassessed the applicant’s eligibility to the disability allowance and decided that she no longer had a right to such payments because of the bank interest accrued on her deposited damages. The authorities noted that the applicant’s parents, as her legal guardians, failed to submit the exact amount of interest accrued. The applicant’s subsequent remedies – including an administrative action and a constitutional complaint – were to no avail.
The applicant complains, under Article 6 and Article 14 of the Convention and Article 1 of Protocol No. 12 to the Convention, that she has been discriminated against on the basis of her disability in that the authorities misinterpreted the domestic law by considering the interest accrued on the deposited amounts of damages an income which disqualified her from receiving a disability allowance.
QUESTIONS TO THE PARTIES
1. Has the applicant suffered discrimination in the enjoyment of her rights, contrary to Article 1 of Protocol No. 12 and/or Article 14 of the Convention read in conjunction with Article 1 of Protocol No. 1 to the Convention?
2. Did the applicant have a fair hearing in the determination of her civil rights and obligations, in accordance with Article 6 § 1 of the Convention?