On December 12, 2024, the Court of Cassation admitted the referendum requests filed in July by the CGIL concerning, among other things, the regulation of unlawful dismissals under the so-called the so-called increasing protection employment contract (“contratto a tutele crescenti” in Italian parlance) under Legislative Decree No. 23/2015.
This system has always interested public opinion and political debate, and still represents a point of fracture between the social partners. Suffice it to say that while, last September 8, 2024, at the first public meeting between CGIL leader Maurizio Landini and Confindustria president Emanuele Orsini, the latter confirmed that “overcoming the Jobs Act would be a plunge into the past, we have a gap between labor supply and demand that is worth 43 billion a year. For us today the issue is attracting people, not overcoming a measure that is working,” on the other hand, the CGIL leader said that with the Court of Cassation’s green light to the referendum questions “a great opportunity opens up for the Country.”
Given the persistent gap between the positions of the social partners and the strong impact that the “contratto a tutele crescenti” has on public opinion (proof of this is, most recently, the achievement of the referendum quorum), it seems useful to assess whether, from a mere technical/legal point of view, the legislation set forth in Legislative Decree No. 23/2015 currently presents substantial differences from the protection offered by Article 18, of the Workers’ Statute, as amended by Law No. 92/2012, such as to make its repeal – in the opinion of the referendum supporters – indispensable with a view to expanding the scope of applicability of reintegration protection.
In its original formulation, the legislature’s intervention was characterized by the automatic determination of the compensation due in cases of wrongful dismissal, based on a mathematical formula, to overcome a system hinging on the discretion of the judge.
Continue reading the full version published in Il Sole 24 Ore.