The issue of motherhood is separate from the dynamics of non-discrimination and gender equality. Objective difference, it allows the establishment of a protection which is addressed only to women. However, this difference is also the one that drives a woman away from the world of work. However, this situation, allied to a more or less latent sexism, is the source of many forms of discrimination. Therefore, even taking charge of biological difference can give rise to a finding of discrimination.
This is what the judgment shows Jurčić c / Croatia delivered on February 4, 2021 by the European Court of Human Rights. By finding unanimously a violation of Article 1is of protocol 1is combined with article 14 concerning the refusal of occupational disease cover to a pregnant woman, the Court succeeded in highlighting the prejudices linked to maternity and the difficulties of access to it.
In fact, the applicant went through a fertilization process in vitro (IVF) and signed, a few days after an insemination, an employment contract for a job 360 km from his home. Having had the good fortune to get pregnant, she asked about twenty days after being hired to receive salary compensation due to a work stoppage linked to complications in her twin pregnancy. However, the authorities ultimately refused her registration as an insured employee and therefore the payment of the benefit. The situation is in fact a fictitious hiring since, even if the applicant did not know her condition, she had been advised during the insemination to rest to improve the chances of success of the operation. In other words, the employee would have committed fraud by signing an employment contract only to take advantage of professional insurance coverage. This treatment of the applicant by the insurance authorities raises the question of possible discrimination in connection with the pregnancy.
Faced with this question for the first time (so far she has only dealt with this question in a …
–
