Council Regulation (EC) No 4/2009 of 18 December 2008 on jurisdiction, applicable law, recognition and enforcement of decisions and cooperation in matters relating to maintenance obligations - Note from the Polish delegation - Main contents

Document date	07-06-2012
Publication date	22-01-2013
Reference	10966/12
From	the Polish delegation
To	Working Party on Civil Law Matters (General Questions)
External link	original PDF
Original document in PDF

COUNCIL OF Brussels, 7 June 2012 PUBLIC

THE EUROPEAN UNION

10966/12

Interinstitutional File: 2005/0259 (CNS) i

LIMITE

JUSTCIV 222

NOTE from : the Polish delegation to : Working Party on Civil Law Matters (General Questions) Subject : Council Regulation (EC) No 4/2009 i of 18 December 2008 on jurisdiction,

applicable law, recognition and enforcement of decisions and cooperation in

matters relating to maintenance obligations 1

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  Note from the Polish delegation

The Polish central authorities, designated under Article 49 of Regulation o 4/2009 i on jurisdiction, applicable law, recognition and enforcement of decisions and cooperation in matters relating to maintenance obligations, have encountered, in its application, difficulties regarding the interpretation of Article 62(2) of the Regulation.

The issue arose from a question posed by a local court in Poland. It is not clear whether, under

Article 62(2) of the abovementioned Regulation, the court competent in maintenance cases can forward the information obtained from the Central Authority on a maintenance debtor (requested earlier by the court) to another public authority in the country.

10966/12 BS/abs 1 This other public authority is responsible, under Polish law, for providing financial benefits to maintenance creditors in place of maintenance (in cases where the enforcement of a maintenance claim is ineffective) and it is the authority to which reimbursement is owed for benefits provided. Article 62(2) states that the information obtained pursuant to Article 61 “may only used to facilitate the recovery of maintenance claims”.

It is important that the abovementioned Polish public body cannot seek recognition and a declaration of enforceability, nor can it claim enforcement of a decision given against a debtor under Article 64 of the Regulation, as the decision given against a debtor upon the request of a public body which claims the reimbursement of benefits provided in place of maintenance cannot be treated as a “decision in matters relating to maintenance obligations” under the terms of Article 2(1) and (2) of the Regulation.

The Polish delegation wishes to know whether the phrase “to facilitate the recovery of maintenance claims” used in Article 62(2) is to be understood as allowing the competent courts (entitled to receive the information from the Central Authority under Article 61(1)) to use this information only internally, within the scope of its own activities, or whether it could be understood more widely, as enabling a further distribution of this information to other public bodies in order to facilitate the recovery of other maintenance claims outside the scope of Regulation No 4/2009 i.

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