INFORMATION NOTE No. 30 on the case-law of the Court May 2001

T.P. and K.M. - United Kingdom (Nº 28945/95)
Judgment 10.5.2001 [Grand Chamber]
(See Appendix III).
FAMILY LIFE
Orphan's pension granted from the date of lodging of the application for entitlement
rather than from the earlier date of the parents' death: inadmissible.
DOMENECH PARDO - Spain (N° 55996/00)
Decision 3.5.2001 [Section IV]
The applicant, who had been appointed as the statutory guardian of her orphan grandson,
was awarded an orphans’ pension payable from the date on which she had submitted her
application (with three months’ retroactive effect). Having submitted the application
more than one year and four months after the death of the child’s parents, the applicant
lodged an administrative appeal with a view to obtaining payment of the pension with
effect from the date of the parents’ death. The court of first instance found in her favour,
but its decision was set aside on appeal. An appeal by the applicant against the appellate
court’s judgment on the ground that it conflicted with existing case-law was dismissed.
The applicant lodged an amparo appeal, arguing that the delay between the parents’ death
and the date on which she had submitted her application for the orphans’ pension had
been the result of factors beyond her control for which she could not be held responsible,
and that she was therefore entitled, in accordance with the constitutional principles of the
equality of children before the law and the economic and legal protection of the family, to
claim the orphans’ pension with effect from the date of the child’s parents’ death – the
event which had given rise to her entitlement to the pension.
Inadmissible under Article 8: the Convention did not guarantee the right to a pension as
such. It was not inconceivable that a refusal to award a social-security benefit, such as an
orphans’ pension, might in some circumstances raise an issue under Article 8, for
example if the normal development of the child’s private and family life became
impossible as a result of the refusal. In the instant case, the applicant had been awarded
the pension for which she had applied; she had not adduced any evidence to prove that
the refusal to award the pension with effect from the date on which the parents of her
orphan grandson had died had adversely affected her private and family life and that of
her grandson: manifestly ill-founded.
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