L'Italy will compensate hundreds of former employees of the Banco di Napoli and the Banco di Sicilia who sued it at the European Court of Human Rights.
Their appeal reached Strasbourg in 2009, but the Court formally opened the “procedural” part at the end of August 2022. Rome, under the agreement accepted by the Court, but not by the applicants, will pay a total compensation exceeding one million euros.
Most of the former employees or their heirs, because many have died in the meantime, will receive 4 euros, while approximately a third will receive amounts ranging between 4.200 and 17.200 euros.
In proposing the agreement, the government also acknowledged that it had violated their right to a fair trial. And that is why former employees will be compensated, as established by the May 2012 ruling of the Strasbourg Court on the case of 4 other Banco di Napoli pensioners. The facts date back to the privatization of the two banks that decided to apply a less favorable equalization mechanism to those who had retired before December 31, 1990, thus paying former employees smaller amounts.
While these people were in court, and were obtaining favorable sentences, law 243/04 was enacted, which in article 1, paragraph 55, which in fact gave reason to the two banks. Because of this new law, the former employees lost the appeal to the Supreme Court. From the documents published by the Strasbourg Court on the case, it emerges that no heir has decided to continue the lawsuit for a hundred former employees who died between 2009 and 2023, and therefore no compensation will be paid to these people.
All those who brought these appeals to Strasbourg, and to whom Italy will also pay 200 euros each for legal costs, were represented by the same lawyer, Giuseppe Ferraro, of the Naples bar.
Article published on 12 October 2023 - 17:42
