Judgment — ECLI:EU:C:2015:643
Date: 2015-10-01
Language of the case: French
Court formation: Seventh Chamber
Subject matter: Principles, objectives and tasks of the Treaties;Social Policy
Procedure: Reference for a preliminary ruling
Origin: France

Summary — Judgment of the Court (Seventh Chamber) 1 October 2015 1. Questions referred for a preliminary ruling — Jurisdiction of the Court — Limits — Jurisdiction of the national court — Establishing and assessing the facts of the dispute — Necessity of a question referred and relevance of the questions raised (Art. 267 TFEU) 2. Questions referred for a preliminary ruling — Jurisdiction of the Court — Limits — Questions which are manifestly irrelevant, hypothetical questions put in a context precluding a useful answer and questions bearing no relation to the purpose of the main proceedings — None — Admissibility (Art. 267 TFEU) 3. Freedom of movement for persons — Workers — Concept — Existence of an employment relationship — Real and genuine activity — Overall assessment of the employment relationship in question (Art. 45 TFEU) 4. Social policy — Equal treatment in employment and occupation — Directive 2000/78 — Prohibition of discrimination on grounds of age — National legislation excluding young persons with a contract concluded for a period during their school holidays or university vacation from entitlement to an end-of-contract payment, paid on expiry of a fixed-term employment contract — Lawfulness (Charter of fundamental rights of the European Union, Art. 21; Council Directive 2000/78, Art. 2(1)) 1. See the text of the decision. (see para. 17) 2. See the text of the decision. (see paras 18-20) 3. See the text of the decision. (see paras 24-27) 4. The principle of non-discrimination on grounds of age, enshrined in Article 21 of the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union and given specific expression by Directive 2000/78 establishing a general framework for equal treatment in employment and occupation, must be interpreted as not precluding national legislation under which an end-of-contract payment, paid in addition to an employee’s salary on the expiry of a fixed-term employment contract where the contractual relationship is not continued in the form of a contract for an indefinite period, is not payable in the event that the contract is concluded with a young person for a period during his school holidays or university vacation. In the present case, the end-of-contract payment is intended to compensate for the insecurity of the employee’s situation where the contractual relationship is not continued in the form of a contract for an indefinite period and young persons who have concluded a fixed-term employment contract for a period during their school holidays or university vacation are expressly excluded from entitlement to that payment. The national legislature thus, by necessary implication, considered that those young persons are not, on the expiry of their contract, in a situation of job insecurity. Employment carried out on the basis of a fixed-term contract by a pupil or student during his school holidays or university vacation is characterised by being both temporary and ancillary, since that pupil or student intends to continue his studies at the end of that holiday or vacation. It follows that, by holding that the situation of those young persons is not comparable to that of other categories of workers eligible for the end-of-contract payment, the national legislature in no way exceeded the bounds of its discretion in the field of social policy. The difference in treatment between those two categories of workers therefore does not constitute discrimination on grounds of age. (see paras 34-37, 39, 40, operative part)