Madam Justice Grima recommended that the Director of Social Service use his discretion to consider a pensioner’s plea just the same. Photo: Chris Sant Fournier

A judge has recommended that a man be given backdated pension payments on purely humanitarian grounds despite ruling that his appeal was legally unacceptable.

Madam Justice Edwina Grima said that, although she had no other legal option but to reject the appeal, she understood the man’s logic behind his request as he had spent an entire working lifetime paying contributions for his pension.

She, therefore, rejected the appeal but recommended that the Director of Social Services used his discretion and accepts the man’s plea.

The court heard how Joseph Deguara reached pension age in April 2009 but only applied for his pension in March 2010.

His application was accepted and he was informed that he would start receiving pension payments from then on.

However, the department refused to pay him a year’s pension, citing regulations that lay down that the application had to be received within six months.

Mr Deguara had appealed the decisions before the arbiter who also turned down his request. The matter reached Madam Justice Grima who heard the man argue that, upon reaching retirement age, his pension ought to be automatic and should not begin when an application is received.

Entitlement to such benefits, pensions, allowances and assistance shall only accrue as from the date on which the relevant claim is accepted by the director

He held that this right is purely based on the fact that he had contributed to his own pension throughout his working life and found it unacceptable that a year’s pension is withheld simply because he had not applied for it.

According to the Social Services Act, the six-month time window applied for applications for a marriage grant, a maternity benefit, a children’s allowance, a disabled child allowance or a retirement or widowhood pension.

The Act also states that, if no claim is made within the time window, “entitlement to such benefits, pensions, allowances and assistance shall only accrue as from the date on which the relevant claim is accepted by the director as having been officially received by the department”.

Mr Deguara argued that the same Act stipulated that the director may use his discretion to consider the claim as having been officially received in good time “if such a delay does not exceed a period of 104 weeks”. He contended that the director had failed to use his discretion according to this proviso.

He said the director had failed to appreciate that it was his accountant, who was responsible for his fiscal matters, who had failed to notify him that an application had to be sent in.

Madam Justice Grima accepted the director’s arguments that the law was clear about the time window by when applications must be received. To back the legal standpoint, the court referred to a court case decided in 2008 which had been instituted by a man who only applied for a widower’s pension six years after his wife had died.

In that case, the case was dismissed on purely legalistic grounds, with a court ruling that ignorance of the law was no excuse.

In view of this case law, Madam Justice Grima said that, although on solely legal grounds she had no option but to reject the appeal, she recommended that the Director of Social Service uses his discretion to consider Mr Deguara’s plea just the same.