Refund regarding the eviction of a sick pensioner with a disability certificate
- A sick pensioner with a disability certificate was denied the right to social housing when the court ruled to evict her for unpaid rent.
- The Commissioner for Human Rights stated clearly: the court clearly and grossly violated the regulations and filed an extraordinary complaint
- The Supreme Court upheld the complaint, set aside the default judgment and referred the case back to the District Court for reconsideration.
According to the Commissioner for Human Rights, the court violated the law by evicting the defendant without granting her entitlement to social housing. In this case, the court filed an extraordinary appeal against the District Court's final default judgment from 2014. In the Commissioner's opinion, "this is necessary to ensure compliance with the principle of a democratic state governed by the rule of law that implements the principles of social justice."
In 2024, the retiree filed a complaint with the Commissioner for Human Rights, stating that she was poor and unable to meet her basic needs. The court issued a default eviction order, excluding her right to social housing, even though she should have been granted one. The defendant fears she could be thrown out onto the street and become homeless at any moment. In 2022, the court dismissed her claim to establish her right to social housing.
The court did not take any ex officio evidentiary actions disclosed in the court files to determine the defendant's financial, health, or living situation. The files contain no documents that could have led the court to a clear conclusion that there were no circumstances justifying the allocation of social housing. Therefore, the court had no basis to conclude that the defendant did not fall within the group of persons defined in Article 14, Section 4, Points 1-6 of the Act on the Protection of Tenants' Rights, the Commissioner for Human Rights argues.
At the same time, he emphasized that filing an extraordinary appeal in the case is necessary to ensure compliance with the principle of a democratic state ruled by law that embodies the principles of social justice. The aforementioned judgment violates the principles of citizens' trust in the state and individual legal security, derived from Article 2 of the Constitution of the Republic of Poland.
Ultimately, the Supreme Court found the Commissioner for Human Rights' extraordinary appeal to be justified. "The Supreme Court did not share the Commissioner for Human Rights' position that the contested ruling directly violates Article 75, Section 1 of the Constitution of the Republic of Poland. (...) However, Article 75 of the Constitution of the Republic of Poland does not directly provide any subjective rights or claims on the part of an individual (...). In particular, it does not provide a subjective right to obtain housing; instead, "tenants" are guaranteed protection of their rights," we read in the justification.
However, the allegations of a gross violation of procedural and substantive law, i.e., Article 15 paragraph 4 in conjunction with Article 15 paragraph 1 of the Tenant Protection Act and Article 14 paragraph 3 in conjunction with Article 14 paragraph 4 of the Tenant Protection Act, raised under the second basis (Article 89 paragraph 1 item 2 of the Supreme Court Act), should have been deemed well-founded. According to the allegations in the extraordinary appeal, the violation of the above provisions during the examination of the eviction case amounted to the District Court's failure to take ex officio steps to determine whether the Defendant was entitled to social housing, we read.
The Supreme Court also emphasizes that "in an eviction proceeding, the court is obliged to determine ex officio whether there are conditions for obtaining social housing, at least to a minimum extent, which should involve determining the PESEL number of the person defendant in the eviction proceeding."
Furthermore, the Supreme Court recalled that 11 years had passed since the issuance of the appealed default judgment. Therefore, in the Supreme Court's opinion, the principles and human and civil rights set forth in the Constitution of the Republic of Poland support the issuance of the relevant ruling.
- In the opinion of the Supreme Court, the legal situation caused by the appealed default judgment - related to the unlawful deprivation of the Defendant's right to social housing - is verifiable and reversible, without leading to unpredictable substantive legal consequences - it was concluded.
Copyrighted material - reprint rules are specified in the regulations .
rynekzdrowia
