CASE OF MUIĆ v. CROATIA
No violation of Article 6 - Right to a fair trial (Article 6 - Administrative proceedings;Article 6-1 - Access to court)
Jon Fridrik Kjølbro;Julia Laffranque;Nebojša Vučinić;Paul Lemmens;Stéphanie Mourou-Vikström;Ksenija Turković
5. The applicant was born in 1948 and lives in Rešetari. 6. The facts of the case, as submitted by the parties, may be summarised as follows. 7. In 1978 the applicant was employed by the Z.B. company of Zagreb. He worked as a driver in the company’s Nova Gradiška branch. After organisational changes within the company he was given notice of dismissal on 14 February 2000. Pursuant to the notice his employment was terminated on 20 November 2000. 8. On 27 November 2000 the applicant applied to the Croatian Employment Bureau’s Regional Office in Slavonski Brod (Hrvatski zavod za zapošljavanje, Područna služba Slavonski Brod, hereinafter “the Slavonski Brod Bureau”), for unemployment benefit. 9. On 6 December 2000 he was granted unemployment benefit of 900 Croatian kunas (HRK) per month for the period between 21 November 2000 and 10 July 2013, provided that no grounds for terminating payment or the applicant’s entitlement to payment arose before the end of the period. The applicant then received unemployment benefit on a regular basis until 31 March 2008. 10. On 29 March 2000 the applicant brought a civil action in the Nova Gradiška Municipal Court (Općinski sud u Novoj Gradiški) challenging his dismissal and seeking reinstatement and compensation for lost salary. 11. On 11 January 2001 the applicant’s employer brought a counterclaim and asked the court to set 20 November 2000 as the day of the termination of his employment (sudski raskid ugovora o radu). On 5 October 2005 it also sought reimbursement of the severance pay the applicant had received. 12. On 23 January 2007 the Nova Gradiška Municipal Court ruled that the applicant’s dismissal from work had been unlawful and that his employment had never been terminated. It ordered the applicant’s reinstatement and awarded him compensation for lost salary. At the same time it ordered the applicant to reimburse the severance pay he had received, and dismissed the remainder of the employer’s counterclaim. 13. On 15 February 2008 the Slavonski Brod County Court (Županijski sud u Slavonskom Brodu) reversed the first-instance judgment in the part ordering the applicant’s reinstatement and decided that his employment had been terminated on 23 January 2007. It also awarded the applicant damages. The judgment was served on the applicant on 5 March 2008. 14. On 30 April 2008 the applicant applied to the Slavonski Brod Bureau for unemployment benefit for the period after 23 January 2007. 15. On 2 June 2008 the Slavonski Brod Bureau rejected the applicant’s claim, finding that it had been lodged outside the time-limit from the termination of his employment on 23 January 2007, as provided by section 31 of the Job Placement and Unemployment Insurance Act (hereinafter “the Job Placement Act”). 16. The applicant appealed to the Central Service of the Croatian Employment Bureau (Hrvatski zavod za zapošljavanje, Središnja služba, hereinafter “the Central Bureau”). In particular, he contended that the time-limit for lodging the unemployment benefit claim should not have been calculated from 23 January 2007, given that the termination of his employment had only been established by the Slavonski Brod County Court judgment of 15 February 2008. 17. On 15 October 2008 the Central Bureau, acting as a second-instance administrative authority, dismissed the applicant’s appeal as unfounded and upheld the decision of the Slavonski Brod Bureau. It also noted that the applicant himself had informed the Slavonski Brod Bureau of the outcome of the labour dispute, and had communicated with one of its officials on 27 March 2008 and 2 April 2008. He had also been informed of the consequences of the Slavonski Brod County Court judgment setting 23 January 2007 as the day of the termination of his employment. 18. In an administrative claim the applicant argued that he had only learned about the day of the termination of his employment after receiving the Slavonski Brod County Court’s judgment in March 2008, and that the time-limit for lodging the unemployment benefit claim should have been calculated from that date. 19. On 20 January 2011 the Administrative Court dismissed the applicant’s administrative claim and upheld the administrative authorities’ decisions. 20. A subsequent constitutional complaint by the applicant was dismissed by the Constitutional Court on 4 April 2012. The decision was served on the applicant’s representative on 9 May 2012. 21. On 21 November 2008 the Slavonski Brod Bureau found that the applicant had not been due unemployment benefit from 21 November 2000 to 31 March 2008. Given that the applicant had already reimbursed part of the unduly received sum, it ordered him to reimburse the rest within 15 days of receipt of the decision at issue. 22. On 16 July 2013 the Central Bureau upheld the decision of the Slavonski Brod Bureau, save in the part concerning the start of the deadline for the applicant having to pay back the money. In particular, it ordered him to reimburse the funds within 15 days of the receipt of his compensation for lost salary. 23. On 12 September 2014 the Osijek Administrative Court dismissed an administrative claim by the applicant and upheld the administrative authorities’ decisions. It found that according to the civil courts’ rulings in the labour dispute the applicant had not been entitled to unemployment benefit for the period up to 23 January 2007. It further found that his unemployment benefit claim for the period after that day had already been dismissed in another set of proceedings. 24. A constitutional complaint by the applicant was dismissed by the Constitutional Court on 17 July 2015. 25. In June 2008 the applicant applied to the Croatian Pension Fund (Hrvatski zavod za mirovinsko osiguranje, hereinafter “the Fund”), to obtain an early retirement pension. 26. On 18 August 2008 the Fund granted him an early retirement pension of HRK 1,890.53 per month from 11 July 2008. The applicant has been receiving that pension since.