Karlsruhe -
The force since 2005, "Hartz IV" rule sets for adults and children are unconstitutional. This was decided by the Federal Constitutional Court in Karlsruhe on Tuesday.
The benefits were calculated correctly. The law therefore does not satisfy the fundamental right to ensure a decent subsistence.
At least with children of school age should be likely to increase. For the first Senate complained that failed in assessing "any investigation into the specific needs of a child" had been.
"Children are not small adults," says the verdict. The deduction made from the original 40 percent compared to the standard rate for single adults is not based on, but "private treaty" has been set.
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In particular, the necessary expenses for textbooks, exercise books or calculators are been ignored, which belonged to the existential needs of a child.
Without cover these costs threaten needy children of the 'exclusion of life chances. " The now annual one-time grant of 100 € for the school needs is "obviously appreciated by private treaty.
The standard rate for a single person from an initial 345 euros a month (currently € 359) had not been identified in unconstitutional ways. The rate was previously derived from the so-called Income and Expenditure Survey.
In the consumption expenditure was placed in the lowest 20 percent of households based on stratified according to their income.
The judges approved of this statistical model in principle. They alleged, however, that were made for individual expenditure items percentage reductions for goods such as fur coats, tailored suits, or gliders, without clarification of whether the comparison group was made of the bottom fifth of all such spending.
With the new rules, the legislature should also be entitled to benefits designed to ensure an "ineluctable," "ongoing," provide "special" needs. This affects about Hartz IV recipients with chronic diseases for which health insurance does not pay. This claim can now be claimed that this would be only "affect rare" cases, it said.
The Constitutional Court ruled on the Federal Social templates and the Hessian Landessozialgericht. In the cases before families had complained of "Hartz IV" from Dortmund, the Bavarian district of Lindau on Lake Constance and the Werra-Meißner-Kreis in Hesse.
