Judgment of the Court of Justice Eighth Chamber, 8 December 2022, Caisse nationale d’assurance pension, C-731/21

• Date: 08 December 2022
• Year: 2022

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Lastly, the Court notes that the inadmissibility of WhatsApp’s action before it against the contested

decision is consistent with the logic of the system of judicial remedies established by the TEU and the

TFEU. More specifically, the TFEU, in particular by providing for the possibility of bringing a direct

action for annulment before the Court of Justice of the European Union or of making a request to the

latter for a preliminary ruling, has established a complete system of legal remedies designed to

ensure judicial review of the legality of acts of the European Union, in which the national courts also

participate. Under that system, where persons cannot, by reason of the conditions for admissibility,

directly challenge EU acts before the Courts of the European Union, they are able to plead, by way of

a plea of illegality, the invalidity of such an act befor e the national court, which, in turn, is able to

make a request to the Court of Justice for a preliminary ruling.

The Court states that the logic of that system, which explains in particular the interpretation of the

conditions for the admissibility of direct actions,

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is that the judicial action of the Court of Justice of

the European Union and that of the national courts complement each other effectively and that the

Courts of the European Union and the national courts are not required to rule concurrently, in parallel

proceedings, on the validity of the same EU act, either directly or, in the case of the national court if it

has doubts as to the validity of the act in question, following a question referred for a preliminary

ruling.

III. FREEDOM OF MOVEMENT: FREE MOVEMENT OF WORKERS

Judgment of the Court of Justice (Eighth Chamber), 8 December 2022, Caisse nationale

d’assurance pension, C-731/21

Link to the full text of the judgment

Reference for a preliminary ruling – Free movement of persons – Article 45 TFEU – Workers – Regulation

(EU) No 492/2011 – Article 7(1) and (2) – Equal treatment – Social advantages – Survivor’s pension –

Members of a civil partnership – National legislation making the grant of a survivor’s pension conditional

upon the entry in the national register of a partnership that was validly concluded and registered in

another Member State

In December 2015, the applicant in the main proceedings and her partner, French nationals residing

in France and employees in Luxembourg, registered, in due and proper form, a joint declaration of a

civil solidarity pact (‘PACS’) with the tribunal d’instance de Metz (District Court, Metz, France). After the

partner of the applicant in the main proceedings died in 2016 following an accident at work, the

applicant applied to the caisse nationale d’assurance pension (National Pension Insurance Fund,

Luxembourg) for a survivor’s pension. That application was refused on the ground that the PACS

registered in France had not been recorded in the Luxembourg Civil Records Registry during the

lifetime of the two contracting parties and that, consequently, it could not be relied on against third

parties. The refusal of that application was upheld in the action brought by the applicant before the

competent social courts.

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Set out in Article 263 TFEU.