The German Federal Labour Court has ruled that pay discrimination on the grounds of gender is presumed if an employee receives less pay for the same work than comparable colleagues of the opposite gender. This presumption cannot be disproved by the fact that the favoured employee had negotiated better.

The Bucharest Court of Appeal has overturned a dismissal decision related to a collective dismissal, drawing upon the reasoning given by the European Court of Justice in Case C-496/22 (Brink’s Cash Solutions). This ruling followed a request for a preliminary ruling made by the same Court during the proceedings.

The Supreme Court of Lithuania has ruled that if an employee’s passive stand-by time at home is restricted by employer requirements, preventing them from using this time for their own interests, it should be considered working time. The Court determined that such restrictions align with the definition of ‘working time’ in Article 2(1) of Directive 2003/88/EC and are covered by Article 118(2) of the Lithuanian Labour Code.

Recent German rulings, following several ECJ decisions, require employers to inform employees about their holiday entitlement and the risk of losing it if not used by certain deadlines. If employers fail to do so, the entitlement remains valid. In the case at hand, the German Federal Labour Court (Bundesarbeitsgericht, the ‘BAG’) needed to decide if a managing director was considered an employee under the Federal Vacation Act.

A judgment of the Supreme Court of Ireland concluded that certain pizza delivery drivers should be categorised as employees rather than independent contractors for the purposes of Irish income tax legislation.