When You Win, You Lose: Maastricht still violating international and Dutch law

A few days ago, Maastricht University sent us the decision of the College van Bestuur in On Point Legal's case against the university [detailed earlier, here]. As expected, they decided not to rectify their blatant violation of Dutch law, international treaty law, the European Convention on Human Rights, and EU law.

Their justification?

Apparently, the College found that the university's interpretation of the treaty "was not unreasonable". The College didn't actually determine whether the university's decision was also the correct decision. At this level of appeal, the administrative body is supposed to review the decision made in a comprehensive way. The College's marginal test is not appropriate at this stage and, in fact, deprived us of any meaningful review of the decision.

The funny thing is that the College does not actually say what they believe the university's interpretation to be. This is important because half way through the proceedings the university changed their interpretation of the treaty. Maastricht University did this, very simply, because they found out that under their initial interpretation, Robert would actually be eligible for the regular tuition rates. Heaven forbid! Change the interpretation!

Because the College did not clarify which interpretation is "not unreasonable," we are still not quite sure whether we do not qualify for the regular tuition rate or not. Also interesting is that the administrative body did not give any reasons why the interpretation is "not unreasonable" or why our interpretation is incorrect or even why the university's own initial interpretation of the treaty was incorrect. Apparently the standard of what is correct has changed to the standard of what is not unreasonable.

Oh, also, while not granting our argument that it is a violation of Article 6 of the ECHR to conduct hearings behind closed doors without either party presenting a pressing reason to do so, they said they are changing their policy in the future.

We persist though, armed with a long list of ECHR violations. We will appeal to the College van Beroep voor het Hoger Onderwijs (the appeal body for higher education). In our appeal we will likely ask for preliminary reference to be sent to the ECJ regarding the EU law aspects of our case. Appealing to the ECtHR is definitely not out of the question.