Introduced in 2022, the benefit gives parents a monthly sum ranging from 54 to 189 euros per household per child until the age of 21, with low-earning families getting more.
It is part of efforts to help families and encourage people to have children in Italy, where the birth rate has been declining for many years.
In Italy, workers who have not resided in the country for at least two years and whose children do not reside there are not eligible for the payments.
The Commission says this amounts to discrimination against mobile workers and breaches EU law on social security coordination.
Giorgia Meloni has said that it is “surreal” that Italy faces an infringement procedure over the ‘assegno unico’.
Meloni argues it would become unaffordable if it had to be given to workers whose children are not in Italy and would lead to a high number of fraudulent claims.
She has vowed to wage a battle over the issue.
ANSA
