The following is a detailed analysis of the court decision, prepared in the format of a professional commentary:
1. The subject of the dispute is the lawfulness of the court’s refusal to issue a certificate of judicial remuneration for the purpose of recalculating the monthly lifetime monetary allowance of a retired judge, taking into account the current amount of the subsistence minimum for able-bodied persons.
2. In this case, the Supreme Court effectively departed from the position set forth by the Grand Chamber of the Supreme Court in its judgment of April 24, 2025 (case No. 240/9028/24), noting that the conclusions of the Grand Chamber in that case concerned different legal relations and cannot be applied to the recalculation of lifetime allowance. The Court emphasized that the special provisions of the Law “On the Judiciary and the Status of Judges” take precedence over the provisions of the State Budget Laws, which attempt to artificially limit the base for calculating a judge’s salary. The Court underscored that the concept of a “subsistence minimum for able-bodied persons used to determine the base amount of a judge’s official salary” is not provided for by legislation, and judges are not a separate social group for whom this indicator can be established selectively. The Supreme Court indicated that the Law on the State Budget does not have superior legal force to alter the components of judicial remuneration guaranteed by the Constitution. Consequently, any reduction in the amount of the subsistence minimum used to calculate the salary constitutes a violation of the guarantees of judicial independence. Ultimately, the Court recognized that the plaintiff has the right to a recalculation based on the actual amount of the subsistence minimum for able-bodied persons established as of January 1 of the relevant year.
3. The Supreme Court overturned the appellate court’s ruling and upheld the decision of the court of first instance, by which the claims of the retired judge were satisfied.
