"RELATING TO CERTAIN ASPECTS OF THE LAWS ON THE USE OF LANGUAGES
IN EDUCATION IN BELGIUM" v. BELGIUM (MERITS) JUDGMENT
65
effects of which would be to deprive the locality of Kraainem of a French
school, a locality "which has a French-speaking majority": "what may
happen as the result of a change in legislation in the near or distant future"
does not concern the Commission. In any case it seems to the Commission
"rather unlikely that the Belgian Government would consider adopting such
a radical solution", which would probably be "difficult" to adopt in practice.
Five members of the Commission find no violation in the case of
Kraainem and the five other communes on the outskirts of Brussels; four of
them equally find no violation in that of Louvain and Heverlee. The
Commission draws the Court’s attention to their dissenting opinions.
4. Decision of the Court
32. The Court will examine in turn the legal and administrative measures
governing access to French-language education at, on the one hand, Louvain
and Heverlee, and, on the other, the six communes with special facilities.
Louvain and Heverlee belong to the Dutch-unilingual region. Although
the legislature has authorised the maintenance of French-language education
there, it has done so, above all, in consideration of the needs arising from
the bilingual nature of the University of Louvain. The principles which
govern the functioning of education in French in the two communes
likewise determine the entrance requirements to this education. The
benefits conferred by the provisions in dispute (Section 7 in fine of the Act
of 30th July 1963 and the Royal Decrees of 8th August 1963 and 30th
November 1966) therefore depend upon their purpose. Essentially, they are
accorded to the French-speaking teaching staff, employees and students of
the University of Louvain in whose absence the establishment could no
longer retain its bilingual character. Likewise, if the French classes at
Louvain and Heverlee are still open to children of French-speaking families
living outside the Dutch-unilingual region, it is because they serve as
teacher training classes for the bilingual University of Louvain. As for the
privilege granted to certain children of foreign nationality, this is justified
by the customs of international courtesy. Consequently, the exclusion of
French-speaking children living in the Dutch unilingual region whose
parents are not members of the teaching staff, students or employees of the
University, does not amount to a discriminatory measure in view of the
legitimacy of the specific objective of the legislature.
The situation is completely different in the case of the six communes
"with special facilities", which belong to the agglomeration surrounding
Brussels, the capital of a bilingual State and an international centre.
According to the information supplied to the Court, the number of Frenchspeaking families in these communes is high; they constitute, up to a certain
point, a zone of a "mixed" character.
It is in recognition of this fact that Section 7 of the Act of 2nd August
1963 departed from the territorial principle, as the Court noted when dealing