Ryanair to pay €10 million in French labour law case
 

Ryanair to pay €10 million in French labour law case

Ryanair Marseille tribunal decision
 

The tribunal has fined the company €200,000 for breaching French employment laws and awarded damages of €8,000,000 plus interest, to be paid to former crews, unions and social security organisations.

La Provence (in French)

The original threat to seize the four aircraft formerly based at Marignane will not be carried out.

The appeal lawyers are probably at work right now!

Wow I think the word schadenfreude is apt.

This may put some fire in the bellies of those other aggrieved countries who have shillyshallied around, without actually doing something beyond timid whining.

Could be the beginning of the end of this particular "employment model" if a few other countries grew a pair.

If they carry this through, and my guess is that they won't, this would put the French a notch or two higher on my ratings, admittedly starting from a fairly low base.

Schadenfreude ..... ich ...... JAWOHL!

Only a matter of months before MOL falls on his sword.

I'm amused to see how French labour law, unions etc are looking after Air France group. They lost €897,000,000 last year and €163,000,000 in second quarter this year and it looks like the group will need to jettison 2,600 employees. Comical they should feel the need to make an example of Ryanair.

@SoberLark : your statement is false, considering Air France (via Cityjet, which they entirely own) has also been found guilty for the exact same reasons in April last year.

Pretty much no chance of it occuring after appeal to EU.

Issue of course will be that lots of countries would only be to happy to start targeting people who spend limited time in countries and live elsewhere, more than a few French companies were playing by these rules especially at senior level.

France looking to support its own industries is pretty standard even when its costing them hundreds of millions a la Air France.

So are you saying Air France didn't lose a Billion Euros in last 15 months ?

No, Racedo, the Ryanair apologist said "I'm amused to see how French labour law, unions etc are looking after Air France group" which fell foul to the lovely comeback above.

The French may be right according to their national law, but it is only driving ANY company (not just aviation) to set up their base/headquarters/whatever anywhere but France.
France is first in one thing at least: first producer of taxes in the world. And last in promoting growth and entrepreneurship (if such a word exists).

Look at the state of French aviation. Apart from a few charter companies working on a seasonal basis, there is no competition for companies setup and based in France (i.e. "French" companies): Airliner, Britair, Regional, Transavia, and, with some differences Cityjet, are all part of the AF group. With some exceptions, none of these actually choose how/when to expand, they just fly the AF flights and can never develop their activities on their own.

You have to understand, more than the law, the French system (and AF with their super-powerfull union system) cannot stand competition. It is about eating the cake on your own and hoping no crumbs will ever be left for anyone behind.

It is a monopoly in disguise, make no mistake, the laws and regulations in this matter are influenced by union(s) who cannot imagine anyone from outside eating their cake. It is not about equality as the French heritage promotes (Egalite, Faternite, etc), it is about the French being angry that someone else succeeds where they have failed, and they (the French CAA backed by French unions), will do anything possible to ensure if they can't succeed, no one else should on their own territory.

Can you imagine that an ATPL of French nationality but having obtained their license in a JAA member state outside France needs a validation to fly in France on French AOC or registered aircraft? That you need to pay more than 100 euros to obtain a piece of paper to fly on French registered aircraft? How mad is this?

As for the case of Cityjet which has been mentioned, they were found to have the same operating practices than Ryanair or Easyjet MORE THAN 6 YEARS AGO! Back then, the French Police was kicking doors in EZ offices to investigate "illegal work in France", but Cityjet was then left unbothered. The case for EZ and Ryanair was quickly dealt with while Cityjet was left alone, of course, because they belong to AF.

Note what a coincidence, that AF has been trying to get rid of Cityjet for the last year or so (with no serious buyers it seems), and Cityjet now gets some legal inquiry... mmmhh, what a good timing. :hmm:

Anyway, the French "exception" is here to stay, same with speaking French on the radio in major airports like CDG... unions are too strong to change mentalities. But that is another subject.

Now I am ready to be shot down in flames by the French crowd, but it feels good I can speak my mind! :ouch:

FLEXPWR,
Last year an EU law came into force which is an exact copy of the former French national law.
The lawsuit against easyJet is still ongoing, in fact Air France was the first one to be convicted.

FLEXPWR. Where is the pprune "like" button?

French labour laws-re FLEXPWR
 

Right on ! The question now becomes; when will France come to the realisation they can no longer compete and the system resorts to total socialism with all that entails, such as the question ;" who will pay for this ? " The possible friction French/English seems to arise again as I understand French business likes the London, England business climate better and
is moving there ? Similar happenings involving French government are showing up elsewhere.:bored:

The question now becomes; when will

all other affected countries follow suit?

There is a well researched and written article on the Ryanair business model by an outfit called Air Scoop all 47 pages of it.

I thought the FR press release on their website was rather more reasoned than the usual teddy's out of the pram we all know and love.

The problem with appealing and i guess they have to, is that it gives more oxygen to the issue, it seems that a bit like the case in Norway and others pending that working for an Irish company, but based in another country you have to play by that countries rules, strange that....I guess if you work for an Irish company you can drive on the wrong side of the road and get away with it because your driving an Irish car.

The French are of course very protective of anything French and their labour practices are a joke, i found the €200.000 fine for breeching labours laws plus costs and interest bringing a total of €8m very Ryanair-ish :D

Could also be come to France but you need to follow the book also which is in the end of the day is not that unreasonable. Took a long time for the case against them when Easy got into trouble years ago. Surely no coincidence also there is only one "base" in France because they knew this was going to happen eventually and they can´t use local regs in one country without doing the same in other countries.

The Irish territory card is still warm and in play but this could also open up the field for similar action in other countries. Is the card valid elsewhere?

I guess that Ryanair will now introduce a "French legal fee surcharge" for all passengers!

Based on my understanding of the news article in La Provence helpfully linked above in sitigeltfel's post, the 2 main points seem to be:

Ryanair was fined 200,000 Euros for breaching French employment laws (the maximum fine for the offences was only 225,000 Euros) so the Court must have regarded those breaches as so serious that they merited a penalty fine close to the top end of the scale. Although a fine of 200,000 Euros is mere pocket change from an organisation the size of Ryanair, the message is very significant.

Ryanair was also ordered to pay damages and interest totalling close to 9 million Euros, the bulk of which represented the obligatory social security charges including pension contributions that seem not to have been paid by the employer on salaries of up to 127 staff working in France during a period since 2007.

Perhaps someone can explain how Irish contracts for its staff in Marseilles might provide its management with reasonable grounds to believe that this somehow made Ryanair exempt from paying French social security charges? Apparently an argument along these lines was run (unsuccessfully) as a defence.