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Benefit Claimants Lose Case

Court Rules Filling Cigarette Machines Isn't Drug Dealing

Two partially disabled Germans got their welfare benefits cut for turning down a job re-filling cigarette vending machines. A German court has denied their claim that the job was "drug-dealing" and affirmed that the insurer's act was lawful.

REUTERS

A German federal court ruled Tuesday that requiring someone to sell cigarettes isn't forcing them to be a drug dealer.

A German court ruled on Tuesday that a government insurance agency had the right to withhold benefit payments from two partially disabled men who turned down a job filling cigarette machines.

The Federal Social Court based in Kassel was responding to a case in which two unemployed former miners from the western city of Gelsenkirchen had turned down jobs replacing cigarettes in automatic vending machines, claiming that doing so was tantamount to "drug-dealing with nicotine."

The defendant was a special federal insurance organization -- with its own set of provisions -- for seamen, railway workers and miners.

"The state does everything it can to get people to refrain from smoking," the men's lawyer told the court. "And now you want to force someone to become a cigarette-dealer? That's insanity."

He added that his clients, 41 and 45, one of whom had been a long-time heavy smoker, had "no desire to become even a little cog in the machine of making someone addicted."

The court held, however, that: "The lawmakers have decided to leave the decision to consumers as to whether they damage themselves. But insurance providers have to give equal weight to the interests of individuals and the premium payers taken as a whole." In this case, they added, personal preferences must give way.

Germany's pension insurance has special provisions for several employee categories, including the self-employed and public employees. There are several gradations of partial disability, which can require people to work for a set -- but reduced -- number of hours, depending on their degree of disability. Rejecting a "reasonable offer of gainful employment" can lead to partial or full loss of benefits.

Twenty-two million Germans -- or 27 percent of the population -- smoke, according to the Federal Statistics Office. Three of Germany's federal states have already implemented partial smoking bans in public establishments such as bars and restaurants, with other states expected to follow suit in 2008.

jtw/dpa

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