Case C-132/11

Tyrolean Airways Tiroler Luftfahrt Gesellschaft mbH

v

Betriebsrat Bord der Tyrolean Airways Tiroler Luftfahrt Gesellschaft mbH

(Reference for a preliminary ruling from the Oberlandesgericht Innsbruck)

‛Directive 2000/78/EC — Equal treatment in employment and occupation — Difference of treatment on grounds of age — Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union — General principles of European Union law — Collective agreement — Failure to take into account, for the grading on the salary scale of cabin crew members of an airline, professional experience acquired with another airline belonging to the same group of companies — Contract clause’

Summary of the Judgment

1. Social policy — Equal treatment in employment and occupation — Directive 2000/78 — Scope

   (Council Directive 2000/78)

2. Social policy — Equal treatment in employment and occupation — Directive 2000/78 — Prevention of discrimination on grounds of age — Collective agreement governing grading and pay of cabin crews of an airline — Taking into account, for the purposes of grading, only the professional experience acquired in the service of that airline, while excluding substantively identical experience acquired in the service of another airline belonging to the same group of companies — Lawfulness

   (Council Directive 2000/78, Art. 2(1)(b))

1.  See the text of the judgment.

   (see paras 22, 24)

2.  Article 2(2)(b) of Directive 2000/78 establishing a general framework for equal treatment in employment and occupation must be interpreted as not precluding a provision of a collective agreement which takes into account, for the purposes of grading in the employment categories provided for in that agreement and, therefore, determination of the level of pay, only the professional experience acquired as a cabin crew member of a specific airline, while excluding substantively identical experience acquired in the service of another airline belonging to the same group of companies.

   While such a provision of a collective agreement is likely to entail a difference in treatment according to the date of recruitment by the employer concerned, such a difference is not, directly or indirectly, based on age or on an event linked to age. It is the experience which may have been acquired by a cabin crew member with another airline in the same group of companies which is not taken into account for grading, irrespective of the age of that cabin crew member at the time of his or her recruitment. That provision is therefore based on a criterion which is neither inextricably nor indirectly linked to the age of employees.

   (see paras 29, 31, operative part)