La Guerche: the dismissal of the staff representative of the transport company was legal

The Administrative Court of Appeal of Nantes a dismissed a former truck driver of the Desert Transportat Guerche-de-Bretagne (Ille-et-Vilaine), who felt that his dismissal for “unsuitability” in June 2018 was in fact linked to “his mandates and his investment” in his functions as a staff representative.

In this case, the green light from the labor inspectorate to dismissal had also been canceled “for lack of checking the absence of a possible link between the request for authorization of dismissal and the protection enjoyed by the employee “, relates the Administrative Court of Appeal of Nantes in a judgment dated March 31, 2022 which has just been made public.

Staying in the company “impossible”

But this simple “error of law” had been purged by the Ministry of Labor, which had taken a similar decision to confirm the authorization for dismissal granted to the freight transport company in La Guerche-de-Bretagne.

The administrative court of Rennes had subsequently confirmed the legality of this ministerial decision in November 2020.

On appeal, the said former driver maintained that he had “serious doubts about the motivations” of his employer: an operations position “had not been offered to him” and there “were other positions available” compatible with his handicap.

A workplace accident in 2015

Recruited in 1989, the truck driver had indeed had an accident at work in 2015 for which a doctor had set him a permanent disability rate of 22%. A “professional reclassification” therefore had to be “proposed” to him by the companyaccording to the occupational physician, by providing “appropriate training”.

A “transactional agreement” had then been considered, but the exchanges between the employee and his management had “not succeeded” note the Nantes judges. Transports Desert had ultimately judged that keeping the employee in their workforce was “impossible” and had therefore proceeded to dismiss him for professional “unsuitability”.

He believes he “has the required skills”

Elected staff representative and member of the Health, Safety and Working Conditions Committee (CHSCT) in 2013, the former employee “did not seem to have the required communication and computer skills” to work as an operating agent, thus justified the company.

The “length of training” was also “incompatible with the replacement of a short-term operator”, and the truck driver “did not wish to participate in one of the aptitude tests (…) offered by a specialized firm” on the grounds that former colleagues placed in the same situation as him had not been subjected to it, according to an elected member of the works council.

Occupational medicine had also vetoed a second position available, this time to be a mechanical storekeeper.

A check for €54,000 and “additional compensation” of €18,000 were offered to him.

Before the administrative justice, he nevertheless certified “to have the skills and qualities required” to work in the exploitation, a position “occupied by former road drivers” like him.

But “this position requires knowledge of social and transport regulations, as well as mastery of computer tools”, recalls the Nantes administrative court of appeal in its judgment. “Computer proficiency, essential for the exercise of the position of operating agent, would have required long-term training. »

“There is no evidence to support” his assertion

“If Mr. X intends to maintain that the motivation for his dismissal would actually be linked to his mandates and to his investment (…), nothing in the file, however, makes it possible to support and confirm this assertion”, adds the court.

“If Mr. X claims that he was offered a settlement proposal on February 2, 2018 for (…) €54,000 and additional compensation of €18,000, this circumstance alone is not sufficient to establish that the decision ( …) would be related to the mandate in the absence of any proven dispute between the person concerned and his employer. »

LB (PressPepper)

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