Judgment No. 2637
Decision
The complaint is dismissed.
Consideration 14
Extract:
"[I]t is convenient to note the different but related purposes of home leave and education grant. The purpose of home leave is not to confer a financial benefit or to make a monetary concession (see Judgment 937). Rather, as pointed out in Judgment 2389, it is 'to enable staff members who, owing to their work, spend a number of years away from the country with which they have the closest personal or material ties to return there in order to maintain those connections'. Similarly, the purpose of the education grant is made explicit by UN Staff Regulation 3.2(c), namely, to provide for a staff member 'serving in a country whose language is different from his or her own and who is obliged to pay tuition for the teaching of the mother tongue to a dependent child attending a local school in which the instruction is given in a language other than his or her own'."
Reference(s)
ILOAT Judgment(s): 937, 2389
Keywords
nationality; place of origin; rule of another organisation; duty station; period; allowance; dependent child; education expenses; home leave; organisation's interest; difference; payment; purpose; official
Consideration 16
Extract:
"So far as concerns the education grant, the argument of discrimination against persons who are the children of international civil servants must [...] be rejected. [The Tribunal considers that] the purpose of the grant is not to confer a financial benefit but to enable a child of a staff member to be educated in the mother tongue of his or her parent and, ordinarily, that will be the language of the country with which the staff member has the closest connection."
Keywords
nationality; place of origin; equal treatment; breach; allowance; dependent child; parent; education expenses; purpose; official
Consideration 22
Extract:
The complainant requests that the effective date of the administration's decision to grant her international status be changed to December 1991 instead of August 2005. "[I]t may be noted that, exceptionally, retroactive effect may be granted to a decision where the effect is favourable to a staff member (see Judgment 1130). In the present case, however, a grant of retroactivity would confer no benefit on the complainant either in relation to home leave or education grant. In the circumstances, the rule against retroactivity should be applied."
Reference(s)
ILOAT Judgment(s): 1130
Keywords
claim; decision; withdrawal of decision; exception; general principle; non-retroactivity; staff member's interest; amendment to the rules; enforcement; allowance; education expenses; non-local status; home leave; date; effect; official
Consideration 20
Extract:
Discrimination occurs when persons in the same position in fact and in law are treated differently, not when there is a relevant difference warranting different treatment that is appropriate and adapted to that difference (see Judgments 1194 and 2313).
Reference(s)
ILOAT Judgment(s): 1194, 2313
Keywords
equal treatment; discrimination; unequal treatment
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