32Moreover, the Court has already held that the method by which a benefit is financed is immaterial for the purposes of its classification as a social security benefit, as is clear from the fact that under Article 4(2) of Regulation No 1408/71 non-contributory benefits are not excluded from the scope of that regulation (see Hughes, paragraph 21). Similarly, the Court has made it clear that the legal mechanism by which the Member State implements the benefit has no bearing on the question of whether that measure is to be classified as a social security benefit (see, to that effect, Case C-85/99 Offermanns [2001] ECR I-2261, paragraph 46).
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