The European Committee of Social Rights adopted during its 326^th session (21-25 March 2022):

• The decision on admissibility in Associazione Professionale e Sindacale (ANIEF) v. Italy, Complaint No. 200/2021

The complaint was registered on 21 June 2021. ANIEF alleges that the situation in Italy constitutes a violation of Articles 1§§1 and 2, 15 as well as of Article E in conjunction with each of the aforementioned provisions of the Charter. ANIEF alleges that the situation regarding educational assistance for disabled children in Italy is in breach of these provisions Charter due to the the lack of job security faced by a high proportion of those employed in this field; the fact that more than 79% of the special needs auxiliary teachers facing job insecurity lack the appropriate specialist educational qualifications; maintaining 82,509 special needs teaching posts in the workforce, which can only be filled using contracts expiring at the end of each school year; the resulting lack of educational continuity, and the inevitable recourse each year to the courts by families seeking to ensure that their children are assigned a special needs teacher.

The Committee unanimously declared the complaint admissible on 24 March 2022.

• The decision on the merits in Associazione Professionale e Sindacale (ANIEF) v. Italy, Complaint No. 159/2018

The complaint was registered on 12 February 2018. ANIEF alleged that Italy has violated Articles 1§1, 1§2, 4§1, 4§4, 5, 6§4, 24 and E in conjunction with each of the provisions concerned of the Charter as regards the situation of some 50,000 teachers, who obtained a primary school teaching certificate (“diploma magistrale”) during or before 2001-2002, i.e., before stricter qualifications for teaching were required by law. ANIEF pointed out that even if these teachers have been regularly working as supply teachers in public preschool and primary school under fixed-term contracts, as of 1 September 2016 they cannot have their fixed-term contracts extended any longer beyond 36 months (as provided by Law No. 107/2015 at the time the collective complaint was lodged). ANIEF also pointed out that these teachers are not entitled to be registered in the eligibility ranking lists to be drawn upon exhaustion (“ERE” lists) from which teachers can be recruited under indefinite duration contracts, because Judgment No. 11/2017 of the Council of State in Plenary Session does not recognise their qualification as sufficient.

Pursuant to Article 8§2 of the Protocol providing for a system of collective complaints, this decision will not be made public until after the Committee of Ministers has adopted a resolution, or no later than four months after it has been transmitted to the Committee of Ministers.

• The decision on the merits in Confédération Générale du Travail Force Ouvrière (CGT-FO) v. France, Complaint No. 160/2018 and Confédération générale du travail (CGT) v. France, Complaint No. 171/2018

The complaint lodged by Confédération Générale du Travail Force Ouvrière (CGT-FO) was registered on 12 March 2018 and the complaint lodged by Confédération générale du travail (CGT) was registered on 7 September 2018. The Committee decided to join the aforementioned complaints lodged by CGT-FO and CGT on 20 October 2021.

The complainant organisations, CGT-FO and CGT, asked the ECSR to find that the reforms made to the French Labour Code (Code du Travail), introduced by Order No. 2017-1387 of 22 September 2017, violate Article 24 of the Revised European Social Charter (the right to protection in cases of termination of employment) on the ground that they lay down an upper limit on the amount of compensation paid to the worker in the event of dismissal without valid reasons. The complainant organisations asserted that this means that victims of unjustified dismissals are unable to obtain through the domestic courts compensation that is adequate in relation to the damage incurred and dissuasive for the employers, and that the reform fails to guarantee a right to an effective remedy against the unlawful dismissal.

Pursuant to Article 8§2 of the Protocol providing for a system of collective complaints, this decision will not be made public until after the Committee of Ministers has adopted a resolution, or no later than four months after it has been transmitted to the Committee of Ministers.