Maintenance Debtors Should No Longer Be Able to Hide Behind Borders

The Justice Ministers of the European Union today agreed that the cross-border recovery of maintenance claims within the European Union should be considerably facilitated.

“Within Europe, maintenance debtors should no longer be able to hide behind borders,” said Brigitte Zypries, EU Council President and Federal Justice Minister. “Those entitled to maintenance – especially children – should be able to recover their claims effectively even if the maintenance debtor lives in another Member State of the European Union or if his assets are located there. Thus, future judgments in maintenance cases issued, for example, by a German court are to be enforceable in France or other Member States of the European Union without any additional procedural steps. Furthermore, EU citizens are to receive even more support from public authorities if they experience difficulties in recovering their claims in another Member State.” Ms. Zypries added, “In more than a few cases, the recovery of a maintenance claim fails purely because a debtor’s address and financial circumstances are difficult to determine following his move to another country.”

In December 2005, the European Commission submitted a proposal for a Regulation which contains rules for the cross-border recovery of maintenance claims. The Council today addressed this proposal for the first time, and agreed upon four major guiding principles for the future work on the Regulation:

• In the future, maintenance decisions made by courts of a Member State are to be enforceable in all Member States of the European Union without the necessity of any intermediate measures.
• A system of Central Authorities is to be established to support EU citizens entitled to maintenance in recovering their claims. For example, these public authorities would provide assistance in ascertaining the place of residence of a debtor or obtain information regarding his assets. 
• The Member States are to be able to continue to enter into bilateral agreements with States outside the European Union in order to also facilitate the effective recovery of maintenance claims in cases where the maintenance debtor lives in a non-EU state. To that end, the Council has requested the Commission to work out the legal framework for the conclusion of such bilateral agreements by the Member States while maintaining the interests of the Community.
• National law is to continue to apply in proceedings without a dimension involving another Member State. This is consistent with the principle of subsidiarity. In such cases, established national rules already guarantee the effective recovery of maintenance claims.

Parallel to the Brussels deliberations on a Maintenance Regulation, a worldwide Maintenance Convention is being negotiated in The Hague. The Justice Ministers today emphasised the importance of the results from The Hague for the future progress on the Maintenance Regulation.