(Finance) – Do not consider national contracts as the only parameters for evaluating fair and dignified remuneration. This is the exhortation that the Supreme Court sends to the judges with the sentence 27711/2023 of the Labor Section, president Guido Raimondi, speaker Roberto Riverso. “We notoriously talk about poor work, or poverty despite work, mainly due to the downward wage competition triggered, in particular by the multiplicity of contracts within the same collective bargaining; which, although necessary, as an expression of trade union freedom and for the protection of the collective rights of workers, can come into tension with the principle of art. 36 of the Constitution which it itself is called upon to safeguard to guarantee the value of the dignity of work” underlined the Cassation accepting the appeal of an unarmed private security worker, employed in Turin, who had appealed to the Court of the Piedmontese capital complaining that his pay was too low. An appeal which, after different outcomes in the two levels of judgement, reached the Court of Cassation.
The Supreme Court has pointed out how in the matter of adequacy of wages one cannot fail to take into account, for example, the EU Directive 2022/2041 of 19 October 2022 which has as its “first declared objective” that of “social convergence upwards of minimum wages” which “contribute to supporting internal demand” , and minimum levels must be “adequate” to achieve “decent living and working conditions”. Furthermore, the supreme judges underline that “no type of contract can be considered exempt from judicial verification of compliance with the substantial requirements established by the Constitution which obviously have a hierarchically superior value in the legal system”. Among tools to carry out verification, the Court of Cassation cites the Istat basket, the amount of the Naspi or the Cig, the income threshold for access to the disability pension and the amount of the citizen’s income, warning however that they are all forms of income support that guarantee a “mere survival” but are not “suitable to support the judgment of sufficiency and proportionality of the remuneration” in the sense indicated by the Constitution and the EU. Now the Court of Appeal must adapt to these principles since “the judge can justifiably deviate” from the parameters of the national collective bargaining of the sector when they conflict with the art. 36 of the Constitution, and “use for parametric purposes the remuneration established in other category contracts in similar sectors or for similar tasks”.
A sentence that, inevitably, fits into the political debate current minimum wage. “An indication comes from the Supreme Court of Cassation, with a historic ruling, which confirms the necessity and urgency of establishing a minimum wage according to the principles established by the Constitution. Collective bargaining, especially in some sectors, – states the secretary of the Democratic Party Elly Schlein – must be supported, so that those who have to work to live are always guaranteed the right to a dignified existence. The government continues to play a shell game on this issue, regardless of the real conditions of many workers in this country. Poor work exists and millions of people experience it first-hand. We will be at their side every day until we get a fair and dignified wage.”
“With the ruling that confirms the need for a legal minimum wage, the Court of Cassation has arrived where up until now the Government has stalled. An important decision, which simply reaffirms what we have been denouncing for some time about poor work. No more delays: let’s demonstrate that even the politician knows how to recognize that the right to a decent salary is guaranteed by the Constitution” he states in a note Action leader Carlo Calenda.
“The minimum wage by law forgets the bargaining that gave rise to an important season of renewals. However, we must also take judges into account when they say that bargaining alone is not enough. This is the work that the Cnel will do” commented the Minister of Labour, Elvira Calderone. The CNEL’s work on the minimum wage, he added, “is at a good point” and “tends to identify the central issue of the quality of bargaining”.
(Photo: Blackcat CC BY-SA 3.0)