SECOND SECTION
DECISION
Application no. 57597/17
M.U.
against Croatia
The European Court of Human Rights (Second Section), sitting on 3 October 2023 as a Committee composed of:
Pauliine Koskelo, President,
Lorraine Schembri Orland,
Davor Derenčinović, judges,
and Dorothee von Arnim, Deputy Section Registrar,
Having regard to:
the application (no. 57597/17) against the Republic of Croatia lodged with the Court under Article 34 of the Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms (“the Convention”) on 31 July 2017 by a Croatian national, Ms M.U. (“the applicant”), who was born in 1960 and lives in Pakrac and who was represented by Mr P. Medaković, a lawyer practising in Pakrac;
the decision to give notice of the application to the Croatian Government (“the Government”), represented by their Agent, Ms Š. Stažnik,
the decision not to have the applicant’s name disclosed,
the parties’ observations;
Having deliberated, decides as follows:
SUBJECT MATTER OF THE CASE
1. The case concerns the fairness of administrative proceedings in which the applicant was found to have a total inability to work and was awarded a disability pension.
2. The applicant was a kindergarten teacher. In 2000 she started manifesting symptoms of a paranoid disorder. In the years that ensued she underwent various assessments of her health condition and her ability to work.
3. In January 2015, while she was on sick leave, the applicant’s general practitioner forwarded her medical documentation to the Croatian Pension Fund, asking for an assessment of her ability to work.
4. In the proceedings that ensued, three groups of medical experts established that the applicant suffered from a total inability to work caused by her mental illness. Relying on those expert reports, in October 2015 the administrative authorities found the applicant unfit for work and awarded her a disability pension. Their decision was upheld by the Osijek Administrative Court (in February 2016) and the High Administrative Court (in July 2016). The applicant unsuccessfully argued that she was fit to work.
5. On 14 December 2016 the Constitutional Court dismissed the applicant’s constitutional complaint as manifestly ill-founded. This decision was served on the applicant on 2 February 2017.
6. Before the Court the applicant complained, under Articles 6 § 1 and 13 of the Convention, about the unfairness of the impugned administrative proceedings. In particular, she complained that the proceedings had been unlawfully instituted by her general practitioner, since at the time she had been on sick leave and therefore still in treatment. She also complained that the first-instance administrative authority’s experts never properly examined her, and that the expert reports had never been forwarded to her.
THE COURT’S ASSESSMENT
7. The Court considers that the applicant’s complaints fall to be examined under Article 6 § 1 of the Convention alone. The general principles relevant to the present case have been summarised in Letinčić v. Croatia (no. 7183/11, §§ 46-51, 3 May 2016, with further references therein).
8. As to the applicant’s complaint that the proceedings concerning her disability pension were unlawfully instituted, the Court notes that under section 123(2) of the Croatian Pension Insurance Act as in force at the material time a general practitioner was entitled to initiate the impugned proceedings upon completion of a patient’s medical treatment. The Court does not find that an issue of fairness of the proceedings arises with the fact that the applicant was on sick leave at the moment of the institution of the proceedings in her case. The experts explained that for ten years preceding their institution the applicant had been refusing to undergo treatment and that there was therefore no prospect of her regaining her ability to work and returning to her post as a kindergarten teacher.
9. As to the applicant’s complaint that the experts consulted by the first‑instance administrative authority never properly examined her, the Court notes that the documents before it suggest that she was personally examined, as required by law. Notably, the expert report contains comments on the applicant’s behaviour observed during the examination.
10. As to the applicant’s complaint that the expert reports obtained during the proceedings were never forwarded to her and that she was thus unaware on which basis she was found to have a total inability to work, the Court notes as follows.
11. As of the early 2000s, the applicant was undergoing various assessments of her ability to work related to her mental health. Once her general practitioner concluded in January 2015 that her condition rendered her unable to continue working in the kindergarten, she referred the applicant for an expert examination and enclosed her medical documentation with the request.
12. The Court notes that the first-instance administrative authority’s experts examined the applicant’s medical documentation and her personally, and that during her personal examination the applicant presented her arguments to the experts. Once the experts concluded that she was incapable of work, a review was carried out by an expert commission which endorsed that finding whereupon the first-instance administrative authority granted the applicant a disability pension.
13. The Court further notes that, following the applicant’s appeal, the second-instance administrative authority obtained an expert report from senior medical experts. Those experts examined the applicant’s overall medical documentation and confirmed that her mental illness, which she refused to treat, caused her a total inability to work.
14. Therefore, following the applicant’s general practitioner’s conclusion that she was incapable of work, three different expert bodies examined the applicant’s medical condition, all of which took into account the arguments she had submitted during the proceedings (compare Krunoslava Zovko v. Croatia, no. 56935/13, § 49, 23 May 2017; Trbojević v. Croatia (dec.) [Committee], no. 57228/13, § 37, 15 May 2018, and Matozan v. Croatia (dec.) [Committee], no. 75112/14, § 39, 29 September 2020).
15. The Court notes that the experts’ reports were regrettably not forwarded to the applicant. However, it observes that the senior medical experts’ report, which endorsed the conclusion of the first-instance administrative authority’s experts by explaining in detail their findings, was quoted in its entirety in the second-instance decision. This decision was served on the applicant, and she was therefore made aware of the experts’ findings and was able to challenge them before the administrative court (compare Matozan, cited above, § 37). The applicant used this opportunity and lodged an administrative action in which she relied on certain documents and argued that she was fit to work.
16. The Court further observes that the Osijek Administrative Court held a hearing which the applicant, although invited, did not attend but was represented by her lawyer. The administrative court examined the applicant’s arguments concerning her ability to work but concluded that the experts’ findings were supported by the documentation in the file. It held that in such circumstances there was no need to obtain a further expert report. The applicant did not complain, either to the domestic authorities or to the Court, about the administrative court’s refusal to obtain a further expert report on her ability to work. Ultimately, the administrative court dismissed the applicant’s administrative action as it established that she met the statutory criteria to be granted a disability pension. This decision was upheld by the High Administrative Court.
17. In view of the above considerations, the Court is of the opinion that the procedural shortcoming that the expert reports were not forwarded to the applicant did not render the proceedings complained of unfair (contrast Bosiljevac v. Croatia [Committee], no. 3681/16, §§ 8-12, 18 April 2023, where the applicant was not properly examined by the expert, where the expert reports, of whose substance the applicant learned only after the adoption of the administrative authorities’ decisions, did not give any reasons for their conclusions, and where the administrative court decided the case on the basis of the Administrative Disputes Act of 1977 under which in practice there was no possibility to have an oral hearing or propose evidence).
18. Accordingly, assessing the circumstances of the case as a whole, the Court does not find that the proceedings complained of were unfair.
19. It follows that the application is inadmissible under Article 35 § 3 (a) of the Convention as manifestly ill-founded and must be rejected pursuant to Article 35 § 4.
For these reasons, the Court, unanimously,
Declares the application inadmissible.
Done in English and notified in writing on 26 October 2023.
Dorothee von Arnim Pauliine Koskelo
Deputy Registrar President
Full & Egal Universal Law Academy