EU Court Upholds Employer Rights to Ban Religious Symbols at Work

As part of a policy of religious neutrality, employers in Germany required their Muslim employees to remove their veil from their workplace. Seized by the latter, the Hamburg Labor Court (north) and the Federal Labor Court (Bundesarbeitsgericht) submitted this concern for equal treatment in employment and work to the CJEU, reported AFP.

For the Advocate General who based his decision on case law, "the prohibition of the wearing of any visible sign of political, philosophical or religious beliefs in the workplace, which results from an internal rule of a private company, does not constitute direct discrimination based on religion or beliefs against workers who observe certain dress rules in application of religious precepts".

However, the magistrate noted, "the employer is also free, within the framework of his freedom of enterprise, to prohibit only the wearing of ostentatious signs of large dimensions". For him, a company’s policy of neutrality "is not incompatible with the wearing, by its employees, of religious signs, visible or not, but of small size, in other words discreet, and which do not stand out in a first approach".

However, "the Islamic headscarf does not constitute a small religious sign" he indicated, while acknowledging that the court does not have the competence to define the terms "small size" and that the context can play a role. "It is therefore for the national court to examine the situation on a case-by-case basis," he stressed.