UNDT/2023/049, Hamon
The Applicant’s request for management evaluation on 15 November 2021 against the ineligibility to the education grant for French nationals residing in neighbouring France and serving in Geneva was time- barred. As such, this aspect of the application is not receivable ratione materiae. Nevertheless, considering the circumstances of the case, the 22 September 2021 Administration’s denial of the Applicant’s 2020/2021 education grant claim constitutes a new administrative decision. As such, the 60-day deadline for requesting management evaluation of this decision started to run from 22 September 2021 and ended on 21 November 2021. It follows that this aspect of the application is receivable.
General Assembly resolution 49/241, staff regulation 3.2 and staff rule 3.9 explicitly exclude from the education grant benefit staff members who reside in their recognized home country, as is the case of the Applicant. Moreover, the fact that Ferney Voltaire is within commuting distance of her duty station, Geneva, does not make the former an area outside the Applicant’s home country, France. Accordingly, the Applicant is not eligible for the education grant because she resides in her home country.
It stems from staff regulation 3.2(a) that the purpose of the introduction of the education grant is to “facilitate [a] child’s reassimilation in the staff member’s recognized home country”.
The Applicant failed to demonstrate that the Organization treated her differently than other international staff members who reside in their home country and work in another country. The denial of the Applicant’s claim for an education grant does not constitute any discrimination against her. The difference in treatment is not discriminatory because there is a lawful and convincing reason for it. Accordingly, the Administration’s decision to deny her education grant claim for her son for the 2020-2021 school year is not unlawful.
By application filed on 11 April 2022, the Applicant, a staff member of the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (“UNHCR”), contests the ineligibility to the education grant for French nationals residing in neighbouring France and serving in Geneva, and the decision to deny her education grant claim for her son for the 2020-2021 school year.
The Tribunal has “the inherent power to individualize and define the administrative decision challenged by a party and to identify the subject(s) of judicial review”, and “may consider the application as a whole, including the relief or remedies requested by the staff member, in determining the contested or impugned decisions to be reviewed” (see, e.g., Fasanella 2017-UNAT-765, para. 20; Cardwell 2018-UNAT-876, para. 23). “[T]he Administration’s response to a request for management evaluation is not a reviewable decision” (see Nwuke 2016-UNAT-697, para. 20-23). “[T]he Dispute Tribunal may only review decisions that have been the subject of a timely request for management evaluation” (see Khan 2022-UNAT-1284, para. 52).