‘Words Mean What I Say They Mean’ or, Social Assistance By Any Other Name

Abstract

This is a further important decision of the Court on the relationship between EU citizenship, the Residence Directive (2004 38 EC) and rights to social assistance – following that of the Förster case (reported in Vol. 1''34 of this Journal). As readers may recall, in Förster the Court upheld the validity of the 5-year restriction on entitlement to social assistance of migrant students imposed by Directive 2004 38 EC (effectively allowing the Council to limit the Court’s earlier judgement in Bidar). In Vatsouras, however, the Court, while upholding the validity of the Directive, refused to apply the Council’s clear intention to prohibit payment of social assistance to migrant jobseekers.