Equal Treatment of Atypical Workers: A New Frontier for EU Law?

Abstract

In order to address the specific issues of worker protection that are raised by non-standard forms of work, the European Union (EU) has adopted three measures concerning ‘atypical’ workers: a social partners’ Agreement on part-time work;1 another social partners’ Agreement on fixed-term work;2 and a Directive on temporary agency work (the ‘agency work Directive’).3 To protect the atypical workers directly from abusive conditions of employment, and to protect workers with standard employment contracts indirectly from being undercut by atypical workers, each of these measures contains important provisions banning, in principle, discrimination against atypical workers as compared to workers with standard employment contracts. There is now extensive case-law of the EU’s Court of Justice on the non-discrimination provisions of the two social partners’ Agreements. This case-law indicates that the principle of equal treatment of (or non-discrimination against) atypical workers forms part of the general principle of equality...