24.6.2014

Official Journal of the European Union

C 194/14

(Case C-153/14)

2014/C 194/17

Language of the case: Dutch

Referring court

Parties to the main proceedings

Appellant: Minister van Buitenlandse Zaken

Other parties: K, A

Questions referred

(a)Can the term ‘integration measures’ — contained in Article 7(2) of … Directive 2003/86/EC of 22 September 2003 on the right to family reunification (OJ 2003 L 251, [p. 12]) … — be interpreted as meaning that the competent authorities of the Member States may require a member of a sponsor’s family to demonstrate that he or she has knowledge of the official language of the Member State concerned at a level corresponding to level A1 of the Common European Framework of Reference for Languages, as well as a basic knowledge of the society of that Member State, before those authorities authorise that family member’s entry and residence?

(b)Is it relevant to the answer to that question that, also in the context of the proportionality test as described in the European Commission’s Green Paper of 15 November 2011 (1) on the right to family reunification [of third-country nationals living in the European Union], the national legislation containing the requirement referred to in Question 1(a) provides that, leaving aside the case in which the family member has shown that, due to a mental or physical disability, he/she is permanently unable to take the civic integration examination, it is only in the case where there is a combination of very special individual circumstances which justifies the assumption that the family member will be permanently unable to comply with the integration measures that the request for authorisation of entry and residence cannot be rejected?

Does the purpose of Directive 2003/86/EC, and in particular Article 7(2) thereof, given the proportionality test as described in the abovementioned Green Paper, preclude costs of EUR 350 per attempt for the examination which assesses whether the family member complies with the aforementioned integration measures, and costs of EUR 110 as a single payment for the pack to prepare for the examination?

(1) COM(2011)735 final.