EU : Court of Justice defines the concept of establishment for application of the directive on collective redundancies

No autonomy criterion. In this new case, the Court broadens the scope of the definition since it recognises that “an establishment, in the context of an undertaking, may consist of a distinct entity, having a certain degree of permanency and stability, which is assigned to perform one or more given tasks and which has a workforce, technical means and a certain organisational structure allowing for the accomplishment of these tasks.” Furthermore, the Court added that the entity need not necessarily have “any legal autonomy, nor need it have economic, financial, administrative or technological autonomy in order to be regarded as an establishment”. The Court stated that it made its interpretation “ given that the objective pursued by Directive 98/59 concerns, in particular, the socio economic effects which collective redundancies may have in a given local context and social environment”. In other terms, the imperative of protection accounts for the adoption of a particularly extensive and flexible conception of establishment so as to cover a maximum number of situations.
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ce, it had already decided that establishment could be “the unit to which workers are assigned to carry out their duties”. The Court added that “it is not essential for the unit in question to be endowed with a management which can independently affect collective redundancies” (CJEC, December 7, 1995, Rockfon, case C-449/93).

No autonomy criterion. In this new case, the Court broadens the scope of the definition since it recognises that “an establishment, in the context of an undertaking, may co

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