Materialnoprawne i procesowe aspekty dochodzenia odszkodowania na podstawie ustawy o wdrożeniu niektórych przepisów Unii Europejskiej w zakresie równego traktowania

Abstract

The paper addresses the issue of liability in damages in case of infringement of the principle of equal treatment within the meaning of the Act of 3 December 2010 on Implementation of Certain European Union Provisions in the Field of Equal Treatment. This Act is an attempt to implement a number of anti-discrimination directives in the Polish national law. Pursuant to Article 13(1) of the Act, anyone in whose respect the principle of equal treatment has been infringed is entitled to damages. In these cases the provisions of the Civil Code (Article 13(2)) and the Code of Civil Procedure (Article 14(1)) apply directly. A very important solution is provided for in Article 14(2) of the Act: an entity alleging an infringement of the principle of equal treatment should only substantiate, rather than prove the infringement. In both legal scholarship and case law of general courts major doubts have appeared concerning: grounds for liability in damages enforced on the basis of the cited regulations, the range of circumstances covered by the facilitation in the form of reduced degree of likelihood of their occurrence or the kind of damage compensated for on the basis of the analysed provisions (the problem of possibility of awarding redress). The paper provides an analysis of various models of interpreting the solution in question and attempts to optimally fit the examined regulation in the system of civil liability in damages.