We would like to close our study by introducing the precedent verdict that we have referred to in the previous chapter. The sentence in which the labour court obliged a company to pay 500 thousand HUF of non-pecuniary compensation for violating the requirement of equal treatment became legally binding on 11th May 2005.
The Legal Defence Bureau for National and Ethnic Minorities represented the young roma man who wanted to take a job as a security guard at a security company. Our plaintiff of roma origin applied three times for the job advertisement of the company and was rejected all three times saying that he needn’t even bother filling out the application form as they don’t want to employ romas.[1]
The aggrieved young man turned to the labour inspectorate first which levied a labour fine of 100 thousand HUF on the discriminating employer.
After this resolution we handed in a petition to the labour court requesting it to establish the violation of equal treatment and oblige the employer to pay a compensation for non-pecuniary damages for discrimination that underlies human dignity.
The court granted our plea and obliged the employer to pay 500 thousand HUF as non-pecuniary compensation. The justification of the court’s sentence was that the fact of discrimination in itself forms the basis of compensation.
As far as we know this was the first sentence in Hungary since the Equal Treatment Act entered into effect in which the court entertained the petition filed for the violation of equal treatment and has awarded a large compensation for the party suffering from discrimination.
[1] For more detail see White Notebook, 2002, the case of Gyula Cs., (www.neki.hu)
and Without a chance, ethnic discrimination on the field of labour (www.neki.hu).