Employment Law
Report on Cyprus Employment Law.
Cyprus labor law is an amalgam of common law principles and statutes. The employment relationship is primarily governed by ordinary contract law principles supplemented by statutory rights and obligations where appropriate.
Read a concise review of Cyprus Employment law by reading our Chapter on Cyprus Labour Law as published in the book entitled International Employment Law published by the Center for International Legal Studies.
The report is available here:
What is “improper behaviour” by an employee towards his employer.
09/07/2016
Our law firm succesfuly defended an unfair dismissal claim against an employer both in the Industrial Disputes Court and the Supreme Court of Cyprus. The claim was brought by an employee working for a company at the position of chief accoutant for nearly two decades. The employee was given several written warnings for improper behaviour, more specifically not obeying reasonable requests by his employer, not communicating to the employer directly, irony towards the managing director of the company and general behaviour that showed disrespect toward the employer. Eventually the employee was dismissed. He then sued the company for unfair dismissal.
The Industrial Dispute Court (IDC) found that the dimissal was fair. The IDC adopted the dicta by Lord Denning in British Leyland Ltd (U.K.) v. Swift [1981] IRLR 91, where Lord Denning set out the correct legal test in this cases by stating the following:
“The correct test is: Was it reasonable for the employers to dismiss him? If no reasonable employer would have dismissed him, then the dismissal was unfair. But if a reasonable employer might reasonably have dismissed him, then the dismissal was fair. It must be remembered that in all these cases there is a band of reasonableness, within which one employer might reasonably take one view: another quite reasonably take a different view.”
The IDC examining all the facts of the case found the behaviour of the specific employee was improper and justified dismissal.
The employee appealed to the Supreme Court of Cyprus. The judgment was delivered on the 8th of July 2016. The Supreme Court dismissed the appeal, adopting fully the IDS’s reasoning and result.
Read the first instance and appeal judgment at the links below.
Michael-v-Theocharides-IDC.16.09.2010
Michael-v-Theocharides-Appeal.08.07.02016