EU Court: unused holidays must be compensated, even among the public
A worker who has not been able to take all the days of paid annual leave before resigning is entitled to a financial compensation. Member States cannot cite reasons related to the containment of public spending to limit this right. The Court of Justice of the European Union decided this by ruling on the case of a public employee of the Municipality of Copertino (province of Lecce).
The employee had resigned to access early retirement, requesting the payment of financial compensation for the 79 days of paid annual leave not taken during the employment relationship. The Municipality of Copertino, referring to the rule established by Italian legislation according to which public sector workers are in no case entitled to a financial compensation in place of the days of paid annual leave not taken at the time of termination of the employment relationship, contested this application.
In today’s ruling, the Court confirms that EU law precludes national legislation which prohibits the payment of financial compensation to a worker for days of paid annual leave not taken if that worker voluntarily ends his employment relationship.
As regards the objectives pursued by the Italian legislator in adopting the national legislation in question, the Court – we read in a note – recalls that the right of workers to paid annual leave, including its possible replacement with a financial allowance, cannot depend on purely economic considerations, such as the containment of public spending. On the other hand, the Court finds that the objective connected to the organizational needs of the public employer for the rational planning of the holiday period actually responds to the aim of the directive, which consists in allowing the worker to rest, thus encouraging him to make use of his days of holidays.
The Court therefore concludes that only in the case in which the worker has deliberately abstained from taking his vacation days, although the employer has invited him to do so, informing him of the risk of losing those days at the end of an authorized reference or carry-over period, Union law does not preclude the loss of that right. It follows that, if the employer is not able to demonstrate that it has exercised all the necessary diligence so that the worker was actually in a position to benefit from the days of paid annual leave to which he was entitled, a circumstance which is the responsibility of the judge of the postponement, it must be considered that the extinction of the right to such holidays at the end of the reference or authorized carry-over period and, in the event of termination of the employment relationship, the related failure to pay a financial compensation for the days of annual leave not enjoyed constitute a violation.
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