Terveys- ja sosiaalialan neuvottelujärjestö (TSN) ry v Terveyspalvelualan Liitto ry and Ylemmät Toimihenkilöt (YTN) ry v Teknologiateollisuus ry and Nokia Siemens Networks Oy.
Date: 2014-02-13
32. In the procedure laid down by Article 267 TFEU providing for cooperation between national courts and the Court of Justice, it is for the latter to provide the national court with an answer which will be of use to it and enable it to determine the case before it. To that end, the Court may have to reformulate the questions referred to it. Moreover, the Court has a duty to interpret all provisions of European Union law which national courts require in order to decide the actions pending before them, even if those provisions are not expressly indicated in the questions referred to the Court of Justice by those courts (see, inter alia, Case C‑45/06 Campina [2007] ECR I‑2089, paragraphs 30 and 31; Case C‑243/09 Fuß  [2013] ECR, paragraph 39; and Case C-342/12 Worten  [2013] ECR, paragraph 30).
33. Consequently, even if, formally, the referring court has limited its questions to the interpretation of Directives 92/85 and 2006/54, that does not prevent this Court from providing the referring court with all the elements of interpretation of European Union law that may be of assistance in adjudicating in the case pending before it, whether or not the referring court has referred to them in the wording of its questions. It is, in this regard, for the Court to extract from all the information provided by the national court, in particular from the reasoning of the decision to make the reference, the points of European Union law which require interpretation in view of the subject-matter of the dispute (see, by analogy, Fuß , paragraph 40, and Worten , paragraph 31).
36. Firstly, it must be borne in mind that, although Article 11(2) and (3) of Directive 92/85 does not entail an obligation to maintain in full the remuneration during the maternity leave, the European Union legislature none the less sought to ensure that a worker receives, during her maternity leave, an income at least equivalent to the sickness allowance provided for by national social security legislation in the event of an interruption in her activities on health grounds (Case C‑411/96 Boyle and Others  [1998] ECR I‑6401, paragraph 32).
37. Nevertheless, that directive, which lays down minimum provisions, does not in any way prevent the Member States from providing for higher protection for those workers, by maintaining or laying down more favourable measures for the protection of the female workers provided that they are compatible with the provisions of European Union law (see, to that effect, Case C‑438/99 Jiménez Melgar  [2001] ECR I‑6915, paragraph 37). No provision of Directive 92/85 therefore prevents the Member States or, where appropriate, management and labour from providing that a pregnant worker should continue to receive all the pay components to which she was entitled before her pregnancy and maternity leave.
38. With regard to the rights connected with the parental leave provided for in Directive 96/34, including unpaid parental leave, such as that at issue in the main proceedings, it must be borne in mind that that directive has two distinct objectives. Firstly, the framework agreement constitutes an undertaking by management and labour to introduce, through minimum requirements, measures to promote equal opportunities and treatment between men and women, by offering them an opportunity to reconcile their work responsibilities with family obligations (Case C-116/08 Meerts  [2009] ECR I‑10063, paragraph 35, and Case C‑149/10 Chatzi  [2010] ECR I‑8489, paragraph 56).
39. Secondly, the framework agreement enables new parents to interrupt their professional activities to devote themselves to their family responsibilities, whilst giving them the assurance, set out in clause 2.5 of that agreement, that they will be entitled to return to the same job, or, if that is not possible, an equivalent or similar post consistent with that worker’s employment contract or relationship at the end of the leave. The Court has held that that provision required the return to the employment post at the end of the leave on the same conditions as those existing when the leave was taken (see, to that effect, Case C‑7/12 Riežniece  [2013] ECR, paragraph 32).
42. In that regard, it is established case-law that a period of leave guaranteed by European Union law cannot affect the right to take another period of leave guaranteed by that law (Case C‑519/03 Commission  v Luxembourg  [2005] ECR I‑3067, paragraph 33; Case C‑124/05 Federatie Nederlandse Vakbeweging  [2006] ECR I‑3423, paragraph 24; and Case C‑116/06 Kiiski  [2007] ECR I‑7643, paragraph 56).
50. In that context and as the Court has already held, account must be taken of the fact that a new pregnancy is not always foreseeable (see, to that effect, Kiiski , paragraphs 40 and 41). It follows that a worker is not always able to know, at the time of her decision to take parental leave or even at the start of that leave, whether she will need to take maternity leave during that leave.
51. It must therefore be held that a condition such as that at issue in the main proceedings has the effect of dissuading a worker from deciding to exercise her right to parental leave, having regard to the effect which that decision could have on a period of maternity leave which interrupts that parental leave. Accordingly, such a condition undermines the effectiveness of Directive 96/34.