Originally Posted by
infrequentflyer789
Interesting looking at this from the UK where one major political party seemed to base its entire referendum campaign on "the EU is good because it gives us employment rights" - surely then this is Ryanair trying to pretend that EU labour law can be used throughout the EU. Unless Ireland is out of compliance (again)? Companies having to play by different local rules in 28 different countries is one of the things the single market is supposed to resolve, isn't it?
A quick google will answer that question. In essence, EU labour law revolves around 4 principles: Individual labour rights, anti-discrimination regulations, right to information and consultation at work and rights to job security. Those are the minimum requirements EU nations must comply with, but each nation is free to extend the rights of workers as their elected governments see fit. Hence the ability for e.g. IE based companies to hire people on zero-hour contracts, or force employees to move to another location without compensation, something which is expressly forbidden in other, more employee friendly, jurisdictions.
In this particular case Ryanair tried to apply Irish law to Dutch labour, and that didn't fly. Which anybody who's been following these cases could have told them and, I suspect, they knew already. Please also note that Ryanair is not appealing the ruling, as such an appeal would set a precedent they really don't want, choosing instead to bury head in sand and continue to pretend they can operate under Irish law throughout Europe.