Supreme Court confirms AOb: compensation for maternity leave during vacation
Secondary education workers who are on maternity or maternity leave during a school holiday should be compensated for this. The Supreme Court has answered this in a case brought by the AOb.
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If your vacation coincides with pregnancy and maternity leave, you should be able to take those vacation days at a later time, the Supreme Court finds. Until recently, missed days could only be made up if they fell during the summer holidays. In case of missed days during other holidays, employers often did not allow this, because the collective labor agreement provided for this.
An employer may not make a distinction in terms of employment on the basis of gender
“By not compensating for holidays for women, however, the employer makes a distinction between employment conditions based on gender,” says lawyer Joost Aarts of the AOb. “And that is prohibited. Furthermore, not compensating for vacation days is contrary to the Work and Care Act. ” Aarts has already discussed this before a case with the Utrecht subdistrict court, on behalf of another member, and won it at the beginning of 2020.
The current proceedings are pending before the Subdistrict Court in The Hague, which is called preliminary questions to the Supreme Court. The Supreme Court has now responded to this.
Employer
According to Aarts, the ruling of the Supreme Court forces employers in secondary education to compensate all holidays that coincide with pregnancy and maternity leave. “If you have not been compensated for vacation during pregnancy or maternity leave in the past five years, I recommend that you contact your employer,” says Aarts.
