NewsletterNewsletter No. 204 – December 2025
EMPLOYEE’S PRIVATE LIFE: An employee is under no obligation to disclose their marital status to their employer, provided it does not constitute a risk of conflict of interest.
An employee was dismissed for personal reasons by letter dated 18 December 2018. He was accused of having concealed and provided false information regarding his marital status, which was likely to create a risk of conflict of interest. Contesting this measure, the employee brought the matter before the Labor Court to have his dismissal declared null and void. Having to address the issue, the French Supreme Court (Cour de Cassation) reiterated the principles according to which “a ground stemming from the employee’s private life cannot, in principle, justify disciplinary dismissal, unless it constitutes a breach by the employee of an obligation arising from their employment contract,” and “the employee has the right, even during working time and at the workplace, to respect for his private life. The employer may not, therefore, without infringing this fundamental freedom, compel employees to provide information about their family situation.” The Court concluded that “the existence of a legal dispute between his wife, a former employee of the company, and the employer, was not sufficient to establish the existence of a conflict of interest, as defined by the charter applicable within the company, which meant that the employee was not required, regardless of the clause in his employment contract obliging him to disclose any change in his family situation, to inform his employer of his marital status” (Cass. Soc. 10 December 2025, No. 24-17.316).
MORAL HARASSMENT: Moral harassment may be established even where the employee does not demonstrate that they were personally a victim of it.
Considering herself to be a victim of moral harassment during the performance of her employment contract, an employee brought a claim before the Labor Court. The employer appealed to the Court of Cassation against the decision of the Court of Appeal, arguing that the grounds relied upon were “unsuitable to establish the existence of specific and repeated acts of moral harassment personally suffered by Ms [T].” The Cour de Cassation dismissed this argument. It reiterated, as a preliminary matter, that “it is for the defendant party to prove that such conduct does not constitute moral harassment and that its decision is justified by objective elements unrelated to any harassment.” It then noted that it followed from the findings of the Court of Appeal that “the management methods within the company had the effect of degrading the employee’s working conditions and were likely to impair her physical or mental health,” so that the employee did not have to establish that she had been personally and directly targeted by the acts constituting harassment (Cass. Soc. 10 December 2025, No. 24-15.412).
MEDICAL CONFIDENTIALITY: The use of an employee’s medical data by the employer constitutes an infringement of the employee’s right to privacy.
An employer obtained information about an employee’s health during a telephone conversation with the employee’s attending physician, before using this information to justify the dismissal letter. Having been ordered against by the Court of Appeal, the employer filed an appeal, arguing that no infringement of the employee’s right to privacy had been established. The Cour de Cassation dismissed the appeal and reiterated that “medical confidentiality, established in the patient’s interest to protect their private life and the confidentiality of information concerning them, covers everything that comes to the physician’s knowledge in the course of their professional practice, that is to say, not only what has been confided to them, but also what they have seen, heard or understood.” It further specified that the employee is entitled, even during working time and at the workplace, to respect for their private life, which includes, in particular, their state of health and their relationship with their attending physician. Consequently, it held that the employer “may not, without infringing upon this fundamental freedom, contact the employee’s attending physician in order to obtain and make use of information covered by medical confidentiality,” and that this infringement alone is sufficient to render the dismissal null and void (Cass. Soc. 10 December 2025, No. 24-15.412).
RIGHT OF ALERT AND TRADE UNION ACTION: A trade union organization may join the action brought by the Works Council (CSE) as part of its right of alert on the basis of the collective interest of the profession.
Three members of the CSE exercised the right of alert provided for in Article L. 2312-59 of the Labor Code. Due to the employer’s failure to respond thereto, one of the elected members who had initiated the alert, along with a trade union organization, brought the matter before the Labor Court. The Court of Appeal declared the trade union’s action inadmissible, on the ground that Article L. 2312-59 of the Labor Code only allows the employee concerned or the elected member of the CSE who triggered the alert to bring a claim before the Labor Court. The Cour de Cassation, however, reiterated that professional trade unions may exercise “all the rights reserved to a civil party concerning facts causing direct or indirect prejudice to the collective interest of the profession they represent,” including, in particular, “infringements of individuals’ rights, their physical and mental health, or the individual freedoms of employees.” It concluded that trade union action is admissible when brought jointly with that of the elected CSE member or that of the employee concerned.
RESIGNATION: A resignation tendered due to an excessive workload is equivocal and may be converted into a constructive dismissal attributable to the employer.
An employee with twenty years’ length of service alerted his employer to the excessive workload to which he was subjected. Subsequently, the employee resigned and then brought the matter before the Labor Court, seeking the conversion of the termination of his employment contract into a dismissal without real and serious cause. The Cour de Cassation noted that a dispute pre-existed the resignation, in the context of which the employee had notably requested an appointment with the occupational physician, reporting a context of excessive workload. These elements thus established the equivocal nature of the resignation, which justified converting the termination into a constructive dismissal attributable solely to the employer (Cass, Soc, 13 November 2025, No. 23-23.535).
SOCIAL SECURITY FINANCING LAW: The Social Security Financing Law, comprising 114 articles, was definitively adopted by the Members of Parliament (Assemblée Nationale) on Tuesday, 16 December 2025.
Setting out the main guidelines for social expenditure and revenue for the coming year, the purpose of the Law is to improve the situation of insured persons while strengthening the sustainability of the social protection system, which has been put under strain by the decline in the working population and demographic ageing. Among the most significant measures are notably the suspension of the pension reform, the introduction of an additional birth leave, and a ten-point increase in the adjustments applicable in cases of undeclared work (Draft Social Security Financing Law for 2026 (CPPX2521641L)).