Court overturns Austrian citizenship refusal over traffic offences

Vorarlberg’s State Administrative Court has overturned the state’s refusal to grant an Austrian man citizenship, ruling that his traffic offences were not serious enough to bar naturalisation, ORF reported.

The man is a recognised refugee who has lived in Vorarlberg since November 2015. He is married to an Austrian woman, has two young children and works full time. He has not received minimum-income support in recent years.

He applied for citizenship in May 2025. The state rejected his application the following year, citing two breaches of traffic regulations and saying there was no guarantee he was positively disposed towards the Republic.

In June 2022, he was caught driving 29 kilometres per hour over the limit in a built-up area and paid a 360-euro fine. In October 2025, he scraped another car while reversing out of a parking space at a supermarket. The damage consisted of two scratches on a wheel rim and several short paint marks on a fender. He did not stop or immediately notify police and was fined a total of 700 euros. Both penalties are final.

The court said the citizenship law excludes applicants only for more than one serious administrative offence with particular culpability. It found the speeding offence and failure to report the collision did not meet that threshold. The court also said the more serious elements, failing to stop and cooperate with the accident investigation, had no particular culpability in this case: the collision happened in a car park, caused only minor damage and endangered no one. The man had credibly said he did not notice the collision.

The court said citizenship requires a forecast of future conduct, but warned that the standard must not be set too high. The speeding incident was four and a half years earlier and took place in an industrial area. There had been no further incidents since the parking-lot collision, and the court found no pattern of traffic violations.

The ruling does not grant citizenship. Because the state’s checks on the man’s income and financial standing are outdated, it must reconsider his application while following the court’s legal assessment. The decision cannot be appealed to the Administrative Court.