Action brought on 29 December 2020 – Stockdale v Council and Others

(Case T-776/20)

Language of the case: French

Parties

Applicant: Robert Stockdale (Bristol, United Kingdom) (represented by: N. de Montigny, lawyer)

Defendants: Council of the European Union, European Commission, European External Action Service, EU Special Representative in Bosnia and Herzegovina

Form of order sought

The applicant claims that the Court should:

principally:

as to the dismissal decision, declare it unlawful;

as to the rights arising from the private law contract:

reclassify the contractual relationship as a contract of employment of indefinite duration;

rule that the applicant was subject to discrimination as to the ground for dismissal relied on and order, in that respect, the defendants to pay EUR 10 000 in respect of psychological damage assessed ex aequo et bono;

declare that the defendants breached their contractual obligations and, in particular, of the obligation to serve valid prior notice in the context of the termination of a contract of indefinite duration;

rule that the applicant was subject to unequal and unlawful treatment and, consequently, order the defendants to reinstate him or, alternatively, to pay him compensation assessed on the basis of the loss of the benefit of the execution of the worker’s contract if it had continued until its foreseeable end;

consequently, order the defendants to pay the applicant compensation for unfair dismissal to be determined in due course and provisionally set at EUR 393 850.08 ex aequo et bono;

order the defendants to pay interest on the abovementioned amounts;

as to the other rights based on discriminatory treatment between the applicant and other EU servants:

declare that the applicant should have been recruited as a member of the temporary staff of one of the first three defendants and declare that the first three defendants treated the applicant in a discriminatory manner, without objective justification, concerning his remuneration, pension rights and related benefits, and the guarantee of subsequent employment;

order the first three defendants to compensate the applicant for the loss of remuneration, pension, allowances and benefits caused by the infringements of EU law referred to in the present application;

order them to pay him interest on those amounts;

fix a time limit for the parties to set that allowance, taking account of the grade and step in which the applicant should have been recruited, the average increase in remuneration, the development of his career, the allowances which he should then have received under those temporary staff contracts, and compare the results obtained with the remuneration actually received by the applicant;

order the defendants to pay the costs.

alternatively:

order the institutions to compensate the applicant for non-contractual liability resulting from the failure to respect his fundamental rights in an amount provisionally set at EUR 400 000 ex aequo et bono.

Pleas in law and main arguments

In support of the action, the applicant relies on three pleas in law.

First plea in law, based on the defendants’ contractual liability and non-contractual liability for the following reasons:

infringement of the substantive law applicable to the applicant’s contract;

discrimination in the decision to dismiss him on the basis of his nationality and unequal treatment in the dismissal procedure as a British national within the European Union, as well as infringement of the right to be heard;

abuse of rights in the successive use of fixed-term contracts and infringement of the principle of proportionality, as well as infringement of the principle of equal treatment and non-discrimination;

legal uncertainty and infringement of the right to good administration, infringement of the European Code of Good Administrative Behaviour and infringement of the right to free movement of workers.

Second plea in law, alleging the unlawfulness of the decision to dismiss the applicant. That plea is divided into two complaints.

First complaint, alleging infringement of the law applicable to his contract of employment (classification of the contract, rules on dismissal, unequal treatment in relation to other British staff working for the European Union, etc.). Alternatively, the applicant submits that the same principles, enshrined in European law instruments, are intended to apply in order to achieve the same results.

Second complaint, alleging the existence of discrimination between workers within the institutions, in particular having regard to the rights afforded to members of the temporary staff (non-payment of various allowances, pension fund contributions, reimbursement of expenses, etc.)

Third plea in law, alleging the existence of non-contractual liability on the part of the institutions of the European Union, raised by the applicant if his head of claims relating to the contractual liability of the defendants were to be regarded as inadmissible or unfounded.

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