Luxembourg, 06/07/2001 (Agence Europe) - Six Italian universities have been "condemned" for having set up permanent contracts for foreign language teaching assistants without taking into account their length of service. The European Court of Justice emphasised the fact that teaching assistants with ten or twenty years experience were re-employed, on unlimited period contracts, on the same pay as young teaching assistants on their first contract.
In the eyes of the sixth chamber chaired by Claus Gulmann, it therefore appears that in the universities of Basilicate and "La Sapienza" in Rome, experienced foreign language teaching assistants (…) receive the same pay, as past experience gained by these assistants over the years is not taken into account".
Similarly, at the universities of Milan, Palermo and, since 1994, Pisa, teaching assistants "are all put on the same pay level irrespective of the number of years they have taught".
The Court notes that thirty eight teaching assistants from Palermo University successfully contested this level of pay before an Italian "employees' tribunal".
It clarifies that the l'Institut universitaire oriental de Naples (the sixth university "taken to task" by the European Commission, the instigator of this lawsuit) did take account of the experience of its teaching assistants when it re-employed them but also increased their hours of employment, "the effect of which was to reduce their hourly pay". The Court recognises that Naples University has been setting out three levels of experience since July 14, 1999, that the Universities of Basilicate, Palermo and "La Sapienza" in Rome "confirmed their wish to resolve the problem of acquired rights of experienced teaching assistants ", but that does not prevent them from being "condemned" by European justice.
The universities are public law bodies but the contracts between them and their teaching assistants are private law contracts governed by the general Italian law of 1962 (law no. 230). Under this law, if an employee sees their fixed term contract renewed to an unlimited period contract, the new contract is deemed to have existed from the date of the employee first being taken on. In addition, teaching assistants benefit from provisions of a recent law of 1995 (law no. 236) which guarantees them "the rights acquired in the context of previous working relations" (length of service and social security: Ed).
This 1995 law had been adopted after teaching assistants had won two lawsuits before the European Court of Justice. They considered the fact that they were only working on fixed term contracts was discriminatory by comparison with Italian teachers who could benefit from unlimited period contracts.
During the case, the Commission observed that this matter was not a run-of-the-mill situation. It noted in particular that the 1995 law is perfectly in accordance with the Court's rulings and that neither the government nor the Italian parliament are under investigation. The ones who are under investigation are only the universities, who by their administrative practices, and according to the Commission, have "boycotted" the law. Technically Italy is being condemned: the case is called European Commission against Italy because Italy are responsible for the actions of public or semi-public organisations.
The Commission noted that these six universities had been those from whom it had received complaints but underlined there may be others. Two, in any case, are in the clear. The Commission gave a glowing report to two universities who had applied the law to the letter, namely Florence University and the Polytechnic University of Turin.
EUROPE finally stresses that teaching assistants have entered Italian universities by the "back door". A teaching diploma for their mother tongue, valid to teach in a language school, was by itself enough to teach their mother tongue in universities.
It is to be noted that the term "lecteurs" was removed from the 1995 law because it led to confusion. Foreign language teaching assistants have become "co-workers and mother tongue linguistic experts", thus putting the emphasis on the advantages that Italian students derive from an expert who has lived in the country whose language they are learning.