The Constitutional Court extends compensation for dismissals in small businesses

The Constitutional Court has declared Art. 8 of Law no. 604 of July 15, 1966, partially illegitimate, removing the size requirement that prevented employees of companies with fewer than fifteen employees from accessing the increases in indemnity for dismissal without just cause. The decision, Judgment no. 174 of 2026, was filed in the registry on October 22, 2026, and is published in the Official Gazette, 1st Special Series no. 43 of October 28, 2026.

The ruling arises from a judgment of constitutional legitimacy brought incidentally by the Ordinary Court of Livorno, acting as a labor judge, by order of February 12, 2026 (ord. reg. no. 39 of 2026). The case concerned a worker hired on a permanent and part-time basis from November 1, 2003, as a healthcare assistant for a dental practice and dismissed for alleged just cause on July 4, 2024, by an employer with fewer than fifteen employees.

The referring judge believed that the gap between 2.5 and 6 monthly installments of the last total gross remuneration was effectively devoid of real compensatory and deterrent capacity: in the specific case, the indemnity would have ranged between approximately 3,600 and approximately 8,600 euros.

What the ruling established

The Court did not abolish the six-month cap, as requested by the referring judge: it declared the constitutional illegitimacy of Art. 8 “limited to the words ‘”, if employed by an employer who employs more than fifteen workers’"". The intervention is therefore purely ablative in nature.

The effect is that the final period of the same provision — which allows for an increase in the maximum amount of the indemnity — now operates regardless of the size of the company:

• up to 10 monthly installments for the worker with seniority exceeding ten years;
• up to 14 monthly installments for the worker with seniority exceeding twenty years.

The Court rejected the substitute solution proposed by the referring judge — increasing the maximum to 12 monthly installments by combining Art. 8 with the halving mechanism of Art. 9 of Legislative Decree no. 23 of March 4, 2015, and with the 24-month cap of Art. 18, fifth paragraph, of Law no. 300 of May 20, 1970 — because it would have created a new precept rather than a remedy already derivable from the system.

The violated parameters and precedents

The judgment accepts all the objections, recalling the principles of Judgment no. 194 of 2018 and Judgment no. 118 of 2025, which had eliminated the six-month cap provided for “new hires” in small businesses. The parameters evoked:

• art. 3, first and second paragraphs, of the Constitution, for unreasonableness and disparity of treatment;
• art. 4, first paragraph, on the right to work;
• art. 35, first paragraph, on the protection of work in all its forms;
• art. 41, second paragraph, on freedom and human dignity;
• art. 117, first paragraph, in relation to art. 24 of the European Social Charter.

Written opinions, admitted by presidential decree on April 29, 2026, were filed by the Associazione Comma2 - Lavoro è dignità and the Italian General Confederation of Labour (CGIL). No party to the main proceedings appeared, and the President of the Council of Ministers did not intervene.

Who benefits and with what limits

The scope is limited: the regime of art. 8 concerns relationships established before March 7, 2015, and the Court expressly defines it as “phasing out.” For workers hired after that date in smaller enterprises, the regime of art. 9 of Legislative Decree no. 23 of 2015 remains in place, as amended by judgment no. 118 of 2025, with compensation between 3 and 18 monthly salaries.

The decision was made by the Court composed of president Giovanni Amoroso, with reporting judge Antonella Sciarrone Alibrandi and the director of the chancery Roberto Milana.

For readers, the impact is concrete but temporally delimited: those who were dismissed without just cause by a small enterprise and have accrued at least ten years of seniority may be granted compensation exceeding the threshold of six monthly salaries, with a maximum reaching fourteen monthly salaries for those exceeding twenty years of service. However, the requirement remains that the judge, on a case-by-case basis, must scale the amount according to the criteria of art. 8, among which the number of employees employed continues to operate as an evaluation element and no longer as a barrier.

Official source: Official Gazette of the Italian Republic, 1st Special Series – Constitutional Court, no. 43 of October 28, 2026, judgment no. 174 of 2026 (decision July 6, 2026, filed October 22, 2026).