In Birgit Bartsch v Bosch und Siemens Hausgerate (BSH) Altersfursorge GmbH (G-427/06) the Advocate General (AG) considered an "age-gap" provision in a German occupational pension scheme. The AG suggested that the provision, preventing a widow(er) from receiving a pension if they had been more than 15 years older or younger than their spouse, did not breach Community principles of age equality at the time of its operation in 2004. However, after 1 December 2006 (the deadline for implementation of EC Directive 2000/78 (the Framework Directive)) the provision would have been in breach and could not be objectively justified.

Applying Mangold v Helm (C-144/04) [2006] IRLR 43, the AG suggested that, once the Framework Directive had been implemented, there was a framework (a national rule implementing a Directive) on which the general principles of Community law could bite. This had not been the case in 2004. Those general principles could then be enforced horizontally (in the private as well as the public sector), operating through the Framework Directive.