8/11/22, 9:16 AM CURIA - Documents Consideration of the question referred 31 Pursuant to Article 99 of the Rules of Procedure, where the reply to a question referred to the Court for a preliminary ruling may be clearly deduced from existing case-law, the Court may at any time, on a proposal from the Judge-Rapporteur and after hearing the Advocate General, decide to rule by reasoned order. 32 It is appropriate to apply that provision in the present case. 33 By its question, the referring court asks, in essence, whether Article 20(2)(a) and Article 21(1) TFEU, read in conjunction with Article 7, Article 21(1) and Article 24(2) of the Charter, must be interpreted as meaning that, in the case of a minor child who is a citizen of the Union and whose birth certificate, issued by the competent authorities of a Member State, designates as that child’s parents two persons of the same sex, the Member State of which that child is a national is obliged to transcribe such a birth certificate, in order to enable that child to obtain an identity document. 34 As a preliminary point, it should be noted that, under Article 20(1) TFEU, every person holding the nationality of a Member State is a citizen of the Union. Since, according to the findings of the referring court, it is not disputed that S.R.S.-D. has Polish nationality, she enjoys, pursuant to that provision, Union citizenship. 35 In that regard, the Court has held on numerous occasions that Union citizenship is destined to be the fundamental status of nationals of the Member States (judgment of 14 December 2021, Stolichna obshtina, rayon ‘Pancharevo’, C‑490/20, EU:C:2021:1008, paragraph 41 and the case-law cited). 36 As is apparent from the Court’s case-law, a national of a Member State who has exercised, in his or her capacity as a citizen of the Union, his or her freedom to move and reside within a Member State other than his or her Member State of origin may rely on the rights pertaining to Union citizenship, in particular the rights provided for in Article 21(1) TFEU, including, where appropriate, against his or her Member State of origin. Citizens of the Union who were born in their parents’ host Member State and who have never made use of their right to freedom of movement may also rely on that provision and the measures adopted to give it effect (judgment of 14 December 2021, Stolichna obshtina, rayon ‘Pancharevo’, C‑490/20, EU:C:2021:1008, paragraph 42 and the case-law cited). 37 Under Article 21(1) TFEU, every citizen of the Union has the right to move and reside freely within the territory of the Member States, subject to the limitations and conditions laid down in the Treaties and by the measures adopted to give them effect. In order to enable their nationals to exercise that right, Article 4(3) of Directive 2004/38 requires that Member States, acting in accordance with their laws, issue to their own nationals an identity card or a passport stating their nationality. 38 Accordingly, since S.R.S.-D. is a Polish national, the Polish authorities are required to issue to her an identity card or a passport stating her nationality and her surname as it appears on the birth certificate drawn up by the Spanish authorities. In that regard, the Court has had occasion to rule that Article 21 TFEU precludes the authorities of a Member State, in applying their national law, from refusing to recognise a child’s surname as determined and registered in a second Member State in which the child was born and has been resident since birth (judgment of 14 December 2021, Stolichna obshtina, rayon ‘Pancharevo’, C‑490/20, EU:C:2021:1008, paragraph 44 and the case-law cited). 39 It must be made clear that Article 4(3) of Directive 2004/38 requires the Polish authorities to issue an identity card or a passport to S.R.S.-D. regardless of whether the Spanish birth certificate for that child has been transcribed into the Polish register of civil status. Therefore, in so far as Polish law requires the birth certificate to be transcribed before a Polish identity card or a Polish passport is issued, that Member State cannot rely on its national law as justification for refusing to draw up such an identity card or such a passport for S.R.S.-D. (see, by analogy, judgment of 14 December 2021, Stolichna obshtina, rayon ‘Pancharevo’, C‑490/20, EU:C:2021:1008, paragraph 45). 40 Such a document, whether alone or accompanied by others, where appropriate by a document issued by the host Member State of the child concerned, must enable a child in S.R.S.-D’s situation to exercise the right to move and reside freely within the territory of the Member States, guaranteed in https://curia.europa.eu/juris/document/document_print.jsf?mode=DOC&pageIndex=0&docid=262081&part=1&doclang=EN&text=&dir=&occ=first… 6/9