Anti-discrimination agency sanctions Cluj-Napoca Municipality for fining commuters with dirty clothes
The National Council for Combating Discrimination (CNCD) has sanctioned the Municipality of Cluj-Napoca for a recently made Local Council Decision that discriminates against people living in poverty, by limiting their access to public transport, Stiridecluj.ro reported.
CNCD found that the act of discrimination had been committed under Article 2 para. (3), art. 10 lit. h) and g) and art. 15 of OG 137/2000 by Decision no. 541 of September 07, 2022, sanctioning the Municipality of Cluj-Napoca with a warning, through its acting mayor, Emil Boc.
Under the provisions referred to, passengers are obliged to wear clean clothes, and those who board the local public transport with dirty clothes that supposedly damage the cleanliness of the means of transport risk a fine of RON 100 to 200.
"The analysis must be made in the context that it is known that in the municipality of Cluj-Napoca there is a large community of vulnerable, disadvantaged people, who live marginalized and isolated on the outskirts of the municipality, their living conditions being characterized by material deprivation and poor sanitary conditions. For these reasons, imposing the condition of having clean clothes on the means of transport, through a subjective, indeterminate, unquantifiable characteristic is not proportionate to the aim pursued and restricts the access of these people to public transport services. Thus, the Governing Board finds that the imposition of a clean dress code, without other objective, quantifiable, determining criteria, leads to subjective interpretations, producing discriminatory effects for various communities and vulnerable groups," reads the CNCD decision, quoted by Stiridecluj.ro.
The CNCD went on to recommend that the Cluj-Napoca Municipality find a balance between the need to protect public property and the discriminatory effects towards different individuals and vulnerable groups, by finding a wording variant of the text of the provisions of the Local Council Decision no. 670/2019 that does not leave room for subjective interpretations and discriminatory effects on disadvantaged categories.
This was the full extent of their sanction.
The Legal Resources Centre, which made the referral to the CNCD, assesses the sanction as only partially satisfactory because of its nature as a recommendation to reformulate the decision’s text, and not an obligation to do so.
Libertatea shared the public statement of Cluj-Napoca Municipality post-sanction: "Cluj-Napoca City Hall has taken note of this decision,” (referring here to the Local Council’s Decision), which is a recommendation. This is a behavior we usually exhibit anyway, when we apply a decision of the Local Council. We apply the decision as it is written, but especially in spirit, i.e. we only apply it if there are abuses taking place.”
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