The High Court has refused a Romanian woman’s application for judicial review of decisions refusing her Jobseekers’ Allowance, Supplementary Welfare Allowance and Child Benefit because she did not meet Ireland’s right-to-reside requirement.
In a judgment delivered on 3 March 2017, Ms Justice Iseult O’Malley considered whether the requirement in section 246 of the Social Welfare Consolidation Act 2005 was compatible with EU law. The applicant argued that different legal tests applied to the three payments and that the decisions had wrongly treated her as ineligible without properly considering her circumstances. The State maintained that the residence requirement was justified and permissible under EU law.
The applicant, a Romanian national, had lived in Ireland with her partner and two children since about 2008. She had worked in the home and at times earned money selling the Big Issue magazine and flowers, begging, and receiving charitable support. The court said her Big Issue sales appeared to have stopped during the year before her applications. Her partner later obtained employment, removing any current residence issue, but both sides agreed the case was not moot.
The judge found that the applicant had not shown that she had been a worker in Ireland or established a real link with the Irish labour market. She classified Jobseekers’ Allowance as a special non-contributory cash benefit under EU rules, with eligibility conditions left to national law. EU law did not preclude a requirement of lawful residence for that payment.
Supplementary Welfare Allowance was a form of social assistance. The judge accepted that a decision-maker must give some consideration to a claimant’s personal circumstances when assessing whether residence would place an unreasonable burden on the social assistance system. She found that the applicant’s work history, lack of other income, earlier exceptional-needs payments and accommodation debt had been considered. The conclusion that her difficulties were not temporary was not irrational, and the assessment was adequate.
The parties agreed that Child Benefit was a social security benefit. The judge held that national law could make eligibility conditional on lawful residence and found no evidence that the assessment in this case failed to comply with the directive.
The judgment did not decide a separate argument about whether Irish verification procedures involved prohibited systematic checks, because that issue had not been pleaded and the applicant had no leave to seek relief on it. The court refused the relief sought; it did not grant the payments.