In corso di pubblicazione su Il Diritto del Mercato del Lavoro

Constitutional Court Judgment No. 118/2025 declared unconstitutional Article 9(1) of Legislative Decree No. 23/2015, insofar as it imposed an insurmountable six-month cap on compensation for unjustified dismissals ordered by small employers. As a result, the compensatory bracket has now been extended up to a maximum of eighteen months. At the same time, the Court reaffirmed the inadequacy of employment size as a decisive criterion for distinguishing between small and large firms, while leaving it to the Policy makers to introduce additional parameters for assessing the “strength of the entrepreneur,” along the lines already suggested in Decision no. 183/2022. Moreover, the new dictum of the Constitutional Court is likely to produce indirect effects on Article 8 of Law No. 604/1966, which shares structural features with the provision struck down under the Jobs Act. It is therefore not excluded that this latter rule may be subjected to a new constitutional review, prompting a reconsideration of the Court’s established case law in this area.