Communicated on 18 June 2020
Published on 6 July 2020
SECOND SECTION
Application no. 32934/19
Loreta ŠALTINYTĖ
against Lithuania
lodged on 7 June 2019
SUBJECT MATTER OF THE CASE
The application concerns alleged discrimination on the basis of age when obtaining welfare benefits.
The applicant, who was born in 1979, is a single mother to a daughter born in 2012. In 2016 she applied for a housing subsidy available to “young families” of low income when buying their first home. The authorities refused to grant her the subsidy on the grounds that the law defined “young families” as those in which both spouses or parents were not older than thirty-five years of age, whereas the applicant, at the time of the lodging of her application for the subsidy, was thirty-seven years old. The applicant complained about that decision to administrative courts, arguing that it amounted to discrimination on the basis of age. She asked the courts to apply to the Constitutional Court for a ruling on whether the different treatment of welfare recipients on the basis of their age was constitutional. The courts dismissed her complaint, finding that the State had discretion to decide which groups were entitled to welfare benefits, and that the applicant’s arguments had been speculative and unfounded. They also refused to refer the matter to the Constitutional Court.
The applicant complains under Article 14 of the Convention, read in conjunction with Article 1 of Protocol No. 1 or Article 8, that she was refused the housing subsidy on discriminatory grounds. She submits that families which are in otherwise identical situation – of low income, raising minor children, and seeking to acquire their first house – are treated differently solely on the grounds of age.
She also complains under Article 6 § 1 of the Convention that the courts did not properly consider her arguments and that they refused to request an opinion of the Constitutional Court without providing any grounds.
QUESTIONS TO THE PARTIES
1. Was the decision to refuse the applicant a housing subsidy on the grounds of her age in line with Article 14 of the Convention, read in conjunction with Article 1 of Protocol No. 1 (see Stec and Others v. the United Kingdom (dec.) [GC], nos. 65731/01 and 65900/01, §§ 54-55, ECHR 2005‑X, and Molla Sali v. Greece [GC], no. 20452/14, §§ 123-27 and 133‑37, 19 December 2018, with further references)?
2. Was the domestic courts’ refusal to refer the matter to the Constitutional Court duly reasoned (see Baydar v. the Netherlands, no. 55385/14, § 39, 24 April 2018)?
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