victory in court for the union delegate dismissed after denouncing moral harassment

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The cour administrative d’appel of Paris ruled in favor of a staff representative of a computer maintenance company in the 10th arrondissement of the capital, which had been the subject of a “disciplinary dismissal” in 2020 for denouncing ” harassment “ in his society.

This design engineer was recruited in 2006. Most recently, he held the position of project management manager for software development. He was also elected union delegate and union representative on the social and economic committee (CSE).

Wrongful accusations, oral attacks…

On January 8, 2020, he sent an email to his general manager to inform him of his “discomfort” and his “distress”. He also expressed his desire to meet him in order to “find solutions” to resolve the difficulties he was experiencing: “for weeks”, the company’s HR director – who became “his hierarchical superior” in January 2019 – had “wrongly accused him of being at the origin of the invalidation of the company’s 2018 professional elections…

The union representative also indicated that he had been “orally assaulted”, several times “in front of his colleagues” and even once “in the presence” of the same general director… Since the beginning of 2019, he had also suffered “moral harassment” “daily” from the of “a few colleagues” and “strong pressure” from his new boss. His “discomfort” was finally explained by the “non-compliance”, by these employees, of the “process and operating procedures”. “They keep [m]e short-circuit,” he complained.

“Quickly”, the general director had therefore “offered a meeting”, relates the Paris administrative court of appeal in a judgment dated September 30, 2024, which has just been made public. But the engineer had in the meantime been placed on sick leave and had “not been able” to honor it.

An internal investigation during his sick leave

An internal investigation had nevertheless been set up in his absence, and “23 employees” heard ; the person concerned “did not wish” to be so. On March 4, 2020, the report finally concluded that the “unfounded nature of the denunciations” and “the bad faith that he clearly demonstrated”. The applicant is said to be “at the origin of the deterioration of working conditions for several employees of the company”: several of them had “reiterated” their “complaints” by signing certificates” to this effect.

The company therefore contacted the labor inspectorate to be able to dismiss this “protected employee” by his union functions in view of his “denunciation of bad faithacts of moral harassment” and the “significant degradation […] labor relations” linked to his own “behavior”. All this “disrupted the smooth running of the company”.

The labor inspectorate gave the company the green light, but the ousted employee then won his case before the administrative court. His employer then challenged the judgment before the Paris Administrative Court of Appeal.

“Only facts concerning a few colleagues”

But “if this email mentions a situation of moral harassment, this only concerns facts concerning a few colleagues without further clarification and not […] so that an investigation can be carried out,” repeats the Paris Administrative Court of Appeal in its judgment.

“The imprecise nature of these indications, which illustrated suffering at work that the person concerned wished to bring to the attention of his superiors, cannot be seen as revealing an intention to harm the people identified in the email. »

“Contrary to what the labor inspector considered […]MX cannot be regarded as having made accusations of moral harassment in knowledge of the falsity of the facts he denounces,” the court therefore concluded.

Same thing for the “various testimonies” of his colleagues who reported a “significant deterioration, through his behavior, of working relations”: they “only identify disparate facts which are imprecise, undated and not detailed , noted the judges. For some, they are […] only mentioned indirectly and not by the employees concerned who are not identified. » Their testimonies “only characterize the existence of a conflict situation”, they summarize.

The green light given by the labor inspector to this dismissal for “misconduct” is therefore indeed canceled, and the company will have to pay 2,000 euros to its union representative for his legal costs. The company has until November 30, 2024 to refer the matter to the Council of State, the highest French administrative court.

/CB (PressPepper)

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