Case Law

Court of Cassation, with sentence no. 38927 of October 27, 2011, has stated that the employer who, with the purpose to gain the benefit of the ordinary or extraordinary layoff, has not revealed the existence of several orders involving significant amounts which evasion would allow the ordinary activity of the company without suspending the retributive obligation and the consequently fallout of the costs on the collectivity, commits the crime of aggravated fraud (art. 640-bis of the Italian Criminal Code).

The Constitutional Court, with sentence no. 303 of November 11, 2011, declared lawful the system for compensation introduced by the so called “Collegato Lavoro” for the fixed-term employment contracts. The provision on which the Supreme Court pronounced its opinion is Article 32, paragraphs 5 and 6, of Law no. 183/2010 which establishes an indemnity, whose amounts ranges between 2.5 and 12 monthly installments, which has to be paid by the employer to the employee in the event that the latter obtained the conversion of a previous fixed-term employment contract into an open-ended one.

The Court of Milan, with reference to the legitimacy of a fixed-term contract for substitutive reasons, with sentence no. 5020 of October 25, 2011 clarified that the fixed-term hiring contract for the substitution of an employee in maternity leave is valid also when the absence reasons change (in this particular case, the absence continued for holidays).

Through sentence no. 37398 of October 17, 2011, the VI Criminal Section of the Court of Cassation stated that the employee who, in order to avoid liberty restriction (incrimination and employment loss), gives false declarations that allow the employer to elude investigations, is not punishable for aiding and abetting.

Should the fixed term employment contract be null and void, the employee is not entitled to obtain the conversion into an open ended employment contract because the nullity of the provision which sets the duration carries away the entire contract.