Keywords
Summary

Keywords

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1 . Social policy - Male and female workers - Equal pay - Pay - Concept -Compensation granted to a worker on termination of the employment relationship - Included

( EEC Treaty, Art . 119 )

2 . Social policy - Male and female workers - Equal pay - Severance grant not paid to part-time workers on termination of the employment relationship - Part-time work-force composed mainly of women - Not permissible unless based on objectively justified factors

( EEC Treaty, Art . 119 )

3 . Social policy - Male and female workers - Equal pay - Article 119 of the Treaty - Direct effect - Scope

( EEC Treaty, Art . 119 )

Summary

1 . Compensation paid to a worker on termination of the employment relationship is a form of deferred pay to which the worker is entitled by reason of his employment but which is paid to him on termination of the employment relationship with a view to enabling him to adjust to the new circumstances arising from such termination . It follows that such compensation falls within the definition of pay for the purposes of Article 119 of the Treaty .

2 . Article 119 of the EEC Treaty precludes the application of a clause in a collective wage agreement applying to the national public service under which the employers may exclude part-time employees from the payment of a severance grant when in fact a considerably lower percentage of men than of women work part-time, unless the employer shows that the exclusion is based on objectively justified factors unrelated to any discrimination on grounds of sex .

3 . Where there is indirect discrimination in a clause in a collective wage agreement, the class of persons placed at a disadvantage, whether men or women, must be treated in the same way and made subject to the same scheme, proportionately to the number of hours worked, as other workers, such scheme remaining, for want of correct transposition of Article 119 of the EEC Treaty into national law, the only valid point of reference .