{"id":24269,"date":"2019-12-02T10:42:00","date_gmt":"2019-12-02T09:42:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.delucapartners.it\/news\/illegality-of-the-dismissal-of-the-mandatorily-employed-worker\/"},"modified":"2026-02-16T16:14:55","modified_gmt":"2026-02-16T15:14:55","slug":"illegality-of-the-dismissal-of-the-mandatorily-employed-worker","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.delucapartners.it\/en\/insights\/case-law-en\/illegality-of-the-dismissal-of-the-mandatorily-employed-worker\/","title":{"rendered":"Illegality of the dismissal of the mandatorily employed worker"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>The Court of\nCassation, under ruling no. 26029 dated 15 October 2019, clarified that, in the\ncontext of a collective procedure for reducing staff numbers, <\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\"><li><strong>the dismissal of a\nmandatorily employed worker <\/strong>shall be considered <strong>unlawful\n<\/strong>if, at the time of the termination of the employment contract, the number\nof remaining mandatorily employed workers is <strong>lower than the special reserve<\/strong> and <\/li><li>that\nthe consequences of the <strong>annulment<\/strong>\nthe dismissal must be traced back to those that can be activated in the event\nof an unlawful dismissal found to be <strong>in\nbreach of the selection criteria<\/strong>. <\/li><\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Facts of the case<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>An\nemployee hired pursuant to the mandatory placement legislation had judicially\nappealed the dismissal sent to him in the context of a collective procedure.\nThe worker had based his appeal on the assumption that, with his dismissal, the\nemployer had breached the so-called special reserve required by law. The\nworker&#8217;s appeal was upheld at first and second instance, ordering the company\nto reinstate him in his post and to pay him compensation equal to 12 months&#8217;\nsalary of the last total <em>de facto<\/em> remuneration. The unsuccessful company\nappealed to the Court of Cassation against the ruling.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>The decision of the\nCourt of Cassation<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The\nCourt of Cassation, in rejecting the appeal of the employer company,\npreliminarily observed that, in this case, Article 10, paragraph 4, of Law\n68\/199 applies. According to said rule, dismissal on the ground of reduction in\nstaff numbers or on justified objective grounds in respect of a mandatorily\nemployed worker may be annulled if the number of remaining mandatorily employed\nworkers is less than the special reserve.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The\nrationale of the rule is to avoid that, in the event of individual or\ncollective dismissals for financial reasons, the worker can <strong>exceed the limits imposed on the percentage\npresence in his company of staff belonging to protected categories<\/strong>,\noriginally hired in accordance with a legal obligation. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>In\nthis context, the Court of Cassation pointed out that the findings of the\ncourts of first instance could not be re-examined in the context of legality,\nbut considered them sufficient to support the decision. The courts of first\ninstance had, in fact, agreed on the undisputed existence, in the company, of\nthe requirements for recruitment pursuant to the legislation on compulsory\nplacement and that, with the dismissal of the worker, the special reserve had\nbeen breached.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>That\nsaid, in the opinion of the Court of Cassation, the protection applicable to\nthe worker is attributable to theoretical case of annulment of the dismissal\ndue to breach of the selection criteria, which exists &#8220;<em>when the\nselection criteria are, for example, illegitimate, given that they are in\nbreach of the law, or unlawfully applied, as they are implemented in\ncontravention of legal or collective provisions<\/em>&#8221; (Cassation no.\n12095\/2016). Therefore, in the case in question, paragraph 3 of Article 5 of\nLaw 223\/1991 applies, according to which &#8220;<em>if the dismissal is ordered without observing the written form, the\nsanctioning regime referred to in Article 18, first paragraph, of Law 300 of 20\nMay 1970 and subsequent amendments, applies. In the event of a breach of the\nprocedures referred to in Article 4, paragraph 12, the rules referred to in the\nthird sentence of the seventh paragraph of aforementioned Article 18 shall\napply. In the event of a breach\nof the selection criteria provided for by paragraph 1, the scheme referred to\nin the fourth paragraph of Article 18 shall apply<\/em>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>In\nfact, the decision of the employer cannot be considered legitimate if, <strong>in breach of a legal provision<\/strong>, it\nincludes, amongst its dismissals, a mandatorily employed worker, thus exceeding\nthe limit of the special reserve. This is because, whilst, on the one hand, the\nlegitimate interest of the entrepreneur in reducing the workforce in order to\ncope with a financial crisis must be taken into account, on the other hand, the\ninterest of the mandatorily employed worker in keeping his job must also be\ntaken into account.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>According\nto the Court of Cassation, this conclusion appears to be in line with a\nrationale of the regulation aimed at ensuring compliance with special reserves\nand the obligations of employing disabled persons, which, only a protection of\na restorative nature of the employment position of the dismissed person can\nguarantee.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Court of Cassation, under ruling no. 26029 dated 15 October 2019, clarified that, in the context of a collective procedure for reducing staff numbers, the dismissal of a mandatorily employed worker shall be considered unlawful if, at the time of the termination of the employment contract, the number of remaining mandatorily employed workers is [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[167,177,190],"tags":[530,941],"class_list":{"0":"post-24269","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"hentry","6":"category-case-law","7":"category-insights","9":"tag-dismissal","10":"tag-licenziamento-en"},"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.3 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Illegality of the dismissal of the mandatorily employed worker - De Luca &amp; 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