30.4.2011

Official Journal of the European Union

C 130/8

(Joined Cases C-235/10 to C-239/10) (<span class="super">1</span>)

(References for a preliminary ruling - Social policy - Directive 98/59/EC - Collective redundancies - Immediate termination of employment contracts following a judicial decision ordering the dissolution and winding up of a legal person - No consultation of employees’ representatives - Equivalence of employer and liquidator)

2011/C 130/14

Language of the case: French

Referring court

Parties to the main proceedings

Applicants: David Claes (C-235/10), Sophie Jeanjean (C-236/10), Miguel Rémy (C-237/10), Volker Schneider (C-238/10), Xuan-Mai Tran (C-239/10)

Defendant: Landsbanki Luxembourg SA, in liquidation

Re:

Reference for a preliminary ruling — Cour de cassation (Luxembourg) — Interpretation of Articles 1, 2 and 3 of Council Directive 98/59/EC of 20 July 1998 on the approximation of the laws of the Member States relating to collective redundancies (OJ 1998 L 225, p. 16) — Provisions of national law providing for the immediate termination of employment contracts following a judicial declaration of insolvency as a result of termination of activities — No consultation of employees’ representatives before such redundancies — Assimilation of liquidator in insolvency and the employer

Operative part of the judgment

1.Articles 1 to 3 of Council Directive 98/59/EC of 20 July 1998 on the approximation of the laws of the Member States relating to collective redundancies must be interpreted as applying to a termination of the activities of an employing establishment as a result of a judicial decision ordering its dissolution and winding up on grounds of insolvency, even though, in the event of such a termination, national legislation provides for the termination of employment contracts with immediate effect.

2.Until the legal personality of an establishment whose dissolution and winding up have been ordered has ceased to exist, the obligations under Articles 2 and 3 of Directive 98/59 must be fulfilled. The employer’s obligations pursuant to those provisions must be carried out by the management of the establishment in question, where it is still in place, even with limited powers of management over that establishment, or by its liquidator, where that establishment’s management has been taken over in its entirety by the liquidator.

(<span class="super">1</span>) OJ C 209, 31.7.2010.