MIL OSI Translation. Government of the Republic of France statements from French to English –
Source: Republic of France in FrenchThe French Republic has issued the following statement:
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An employee and his employer sign a conventional termination terminating the employment contract. The employee justifies his departure by his desire for professional retraining. However, he leaves his position in order to create a company competing with that of his employer. The latter learns of this and takes legal action. He requests the cancellation of the termination agreement and mentions that he would not have given his consent to it if he had known his employee’s real plan.
The Court of Appeal upholds the employer’s request and annuls the mutual termination. In its view, the employee deliberately concealed information in order to obtain the employer’s consent to this termination. The latter is therefore abusive and produces the effects of a resignation. The employee appeals to the Court of Cassation and considers that it cannot be a resignation without a clear and unequivocal intention on his part.
The Court of Cassation rejects the appeal. According to it, the cancellation of the mutual termination agreement caused by a defect in the employer’s consent produces the effects of a resignation.
Thus, deliberately concealing information in order to obtain the employer’s consent to a mutual termination produces the effects of a resignation. For the employee, it includes the payment of the compensatory indemnity for notice of resignation and the reimbursement of the severance pay.
Please note
This solution is new since it is the first case in which the Court of Cassation has declared the cancellation of a mutual termination agreement due to lack of consent on the part of the employer.
EDITOR’S NOTE: This article is a translation. Apologies should the grammar and/or sentence structure not be perfect.