| DISCRIMINATION — Disability — Employment — Dismissal of employee on grounds of sickness — Whether within EC Directive on equal treatment in employment — Council Directive 2000/78EC
Chacón Navas v Eurest Colectividades SA (Case C-13/05)
ECJ: President Skouris, Judges Jann, Timmermans, Rosas, Schiemann, Makarczyk, Puissochet, Colneric, Lenaerts, Kūris, Juhász, Levits and Ó Caoimh: 11 July 2006
A person dismissed purely on account of sickness was not discriminated against on grounds of “disability” in the meaning of, and therefore did not come within the scope of, Council Directive 2000/78/EC on equal treatment in employment and occupation.
The Grand Chamber of the Court of Justice of the European Communities so held, inter alia, on a reference for a preliminary ruling by the Juzgado de lo Social No 33 de Madrid, Spain.
A medical certificate relating to the claimant, an employee of the defendant in Spain, stated that the claimant was unfit to work on grounds of sickness and that she would not be able to return to work in the short term. Eight months later, she was dismissed. In proceedings in which the claimant sought an order that the dismissal was void and for her to be reinstated in her post, the referring court sought a ruling on, inter alia, whether, in so far as Directive 2000/78 prohibited discrimination on the ground of disability, it conferred protection on a person who had been dismissed solely on account of illness.
Art 1 of Directive 2000/78 provides: “The purpose of this Directive is to lay down a general framework for combating discrimination on the grounds of religion or belief, disability, age or sexual orientation as regards employment and occupation, with a view to putting into effect in the member states the principle of equal treatment.” The seventeenth recital in the Preamble states: “This Directive does not require the recruitment, promotion, maintenance in employment or training of an individual who is not competent, capable and available to perform the essential functions of the post … without prejudice to the obligation to provide reasonable accommodation for people with disabilities.”
THE COURT said that “disability” in the context of the Directive referred to a limitation resulting from physical, mental or psychological impairments which hindered participation in professional life over a long period of time. “Sickness” could not be equated with “disability”. A person who had been dismissed solely on account of sickness therefore did not fall within the Directive. The court ruled further: (i) the prohibition by the Directive, as regarded dismissal, of discrimination on grounds of disability precluded dismissal on grounds of disability which, in the light of the obligation to provided reasonable accommodation for people with disabilities, was not justified by the fact that the person was not competent, capable and available to perform the essential functions of his post; (ii) sickness could not as such be regarded as a ground in addition to those in relation to which the Directive prohibited discrimination.
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