In a ruling on 28 June, the Appeal Court of Amiens ordered the US investment fund Sun Capital to compensate employees that were made redundant from Lee Cooper’s French subsidiary on the grounds of having taken decisions that ran counter to the company’s interests and ultimately resulted in its collapse. With the notion of co-employment now much tighter, the road lies open to claims being brought against a parent company or a shareholder on the basis of extra-contractual liability. According to our information this case is the first where a main shareholder has been made liable in this way.
Although the solution is not groundbreaking, the toughening of criteria that apply to co-employment (c.f. article No. 8499 on the Molex ruling) invoking tortious responsibility may nonetheless be marking a return. In two rulings delivered in June 2014, the Court of Cassation confirmed the joint liability of a Luxemburg based investment fund that was the sole shareholder of a bankrupt French subsidiary. The fund was made liable for paying €3,000 in damages and interest to each to the subsidiary’
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