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The European Pay Transparency Directive requires employers to provide greater insight into pay structures and to actively ensure equal pay. We wrote a blog post about this just last week.

One of the requirements of this law is to establish a pay structure or a job evaluation system. To support employers in this process, the Ministry of Social Affairs and Employment (SZW) recently published a guide on job evaluation and pay structure. This could help in setting up an objective and gender-neutral pay system—one of the mandatory components of the new law. 

Our advice: don’t wait for formal implementation, but start reviewing your compensation policy and job structure now.

Want to know more? View the guide here

Questions about this bill? Please contact Dennis Oud, Tessa Sipkema, Elke Hofman-Bijvank, or Noa Bilogrevic.

Admissibility is often the first step in assessing an objection or appeal: is the objector or claimant entitled to challenge a decision, or do they lack a legitimate interest in doing so? This issue was also addressed in the judgment of the Gelderland District Court of 3 April 2026.

The facts of the case were as follows. Several owners of holiday homes in a woodland park had submitted an enforcement request to the local authority because a holiday home in the park was being permanently occupied, whereas this was not permitted under the local plan. The local authority declared the enforcement request inadmissible. In the municipality’s view, the applicants were not interested parties. The applicants lodged an objection against this decision, but this objection was also declared inadmissible. The applicants then took the matter to court.

The court then had to assess whether these individuals were interested parties. Some of the claimants were former owners. As they no longer lived in the park, they were not affected by the permanent occupation. They were therefore not interested parties.

The other claimant owned a 1/114th share of the communal woodland park. She argued that the woodland park would fall into disrepair as a result of the permanent occupation of the holiday home, that it would increase the risk of crime, and that the planning character of the woodland park would be impaired.

Although the claimant, as a co-owner of the woodland park, might be considered an interested party, the court ruled in this case that the appeal should be declared inadmissible. This was because the claimant did not suffer any significant consequences from the permanent occupation of the holiday home. Not only was her holiday home located approximately 250 metres away from the permanently occupied holiday home and did she therefore have no view of it, but the general objections raised by the claimant also did not distinguish her from others, meaning that she could not be considered an interested party.

This ruling shows that the criterion of ‘consequences of any significance’ remains decisive in determining an interest in environmental law. General concerns are insufficient to be regarded as an interested party.

Do you have any questions about your position or are you unsure whether you are an interested party in a decision? Please contact Gerard van der Wende or with me.

Last week, the Advisory Division of the Council of State published its opinion on the bill to implement the European Directive on pay transparency between men and women.

To recap the rationale behind this directive: to increase transparency regarding pay and pay policies, and to make unjustified pay gaps between men and women more visible and easier to address. The bill includes provisions on access to pay criteria, employees’ requests for information, and reporting obligations for employers (with more than 100 employees). So there is work to be done.

The Council of State is critical of the feasibility of the proposal, particularly for employers. The advisory opinion emphasizes that the proposal imposes significant administrative burdens and additional obligations on employers.

Furthermore, the Council of State raises questions about the chosen implementation approach. For instance, the Division asks why the option of having the government centrally handle part of the payroll reporting was not utilized, as this could have potentially reduced the administrative burden on employers. It also requests further clarification on, among other things, the unfeasible implementation deadline of June 7, 2026, and whether this will affect the first reporting dates. In addition, privacy issues remain, and the Division recommends providing clarity on whether, and if so, how employers must include the compensation of non-binary individuals when complying with the proposal’s obligations.

The Council of State’s message is clear: the government will need to provide further justification and clarification on several points of this bill before the process can move forward. This is relevant for employers because the practical impact of this law is not yet fully determined or clear in all respects.

Employers would be wise to, at a minimum:

• Adjust the hiring process where necessary: provide clarity on the salary range prior to the compensation discussion and stop asking about previous salary(ies);
• Ensure that job profiles or descriptions are up to date;
• Establish and/or review a job evaluation system. Determine which positions can be placed in the same category.
• Place the categories on the salary scale and determine the ranges for those categories.
• Check for any unjustified pay gaps between men and women in the same category and resolve these as much as possible.

Read the Council of State's opinion here. 

Do you have any questions about this bill? Please contact Dennis Oud, Tessa Sipkema, Elke Hofman-Bijvank, or Noa Bilogrevic.

How far does the principle of legitimate expectations extend? It is a question that has often been debated in case law, but one that still raises many questions.

This was also the case in the ruling of the Administrative Law Division of the Council of State on 1 April 2026. This case concerns a care provider who has been running a care farm for a long time and wishes to expand his activities to include a 24-hour care facility. Over a period of four years, the council had explicitly adopted a positive position in principle on three occasions regarding a residential care centre on the site, following which the care provider submitted an application. Subsequently, the council suddenly indicated that it no longer wished to cooperate and also proposed to the council that the required declaration of no objection should not be issued. The council ultimately did not issue this declaration, partly because it believed that an acceptable living environment could not be guaranteed at the location. The planning application was therefore rejected.

The entrepreneur did not agree with this decision and invoked the principle of legitimate expectations. After all, he had received positive signals from the council for years and felt that he should have been able to rely on them.

The Division acknowledges that the healthcare provider could reasonably have expected the council to cooperate with the project. However, this does not mean that the reliance on the principle of legitimate expectations was successful. The crucial factor is, in fact, who raised those expectations. For a successful appeal to the principle of legitimate expectations, the trust must have been raised by, or be attributable to, the competent administrative body. That is where the problem lies here.

The statements were made by the council. The council is not bound by the council’s statements, unless the council endorses those statements. That was not the case here. This means that whilst the entrepreneur was entitled to rely on a positive attitude from the council, this did not automatically mean that the council would also take a positive decision. The reliance on the principle of legitimate expectations therefore failed.

This ruling once again highlights how important it is to be clear about who is making a commitment, whether that person is authorised to make a commitment on behalf of the competent administrative body, and whether, as a citizen or business, you can reasonably expect, on the basis of that commitment, that something will or will not happen.

Do you have any questions about the scope of the principle of legitimate expectations? Please contact Gerard van der Wende or Fleur Huisman.

You can read the ruling here.

As an employer, you carefully follow the company doctor’s advice during the first two years of illness. However, it is possible that the UWV’s medical examiner may later reach a different conclusion during the WIA assessment. The UWV may then determine that insufficient reintegration efforts have been made, resulting in a wage penalty (termination of the obligation to continue paying wages). This creates significant uncertainty for employers.
With the “Bill to Amend the Assessment of Reintegration Efforts and the WIA Advance Payment Scheme” (hereinafter: the bill), the government aims to eliminate this uncertainty and address the structural backlogs at the UWV. 

What does the bill contain?

The bill includes amendments related to the reintegration report assessment (RIV assessment), the waiver of improperly paid WIA advances, and a few limited changes and clarifications to the Wajong.

Reintegration Report Assessment

The most significant change for employers is that, in principle, the UWV must base its RIV assessment on the company doctor’s opinion regarding the employee’s work capacity. The insurance doctor will no longer evaluate this opinion. However, the UWV will still assess whether the employer and employee have made sufficient efforts toward reintegration in line with that advice. As a result, wage sanctions based on a medical difference of opinion between the company doctor and the insurance doctor would no longer be possible. 

Waiver of WIA Advances

Due to backlogs at the UWV, current and former employees often receive an advance payment while awaiting a decision on their WIA application. If it later turns out that there is no entitlement, or only a partial entitlement, to WIA benefits, that advance must in principle be repaid. The bill includes a temporary measure under which the advance does not have to be repaid, or only partially repaid, so that (former) employees are not later faced with substantial recovery claims as a result of the long waiting times. This measure should have no financial impact on the premiums that individual employers pay to the UWV, as the advances are charged to the Aof. 

Wajong

The bill also includes several amendments and clarifications to the Wajong (the benefit for young people with disabilities). 

What does this mean in practice?

The bill helps to eliminate as much uncertainty as possible regarding a potential wage penalty. In principle, employers who follow the company doctor’s advice and carefully implement the reintegration process are on the right track. It will still be some time before the bill actually takes effect. Until then, it is important for employers to ensure the reintegration process proceeds correctly and to critically evaluate the company doctor’s advice themselves. If you have any doubts, request an expert opinion from the UWV in a timely manner so that adjustments can be made and the risk of a wage penalty is reduced.  

Do you have questions about reintegration or about avoiding a wage penalty? We’re happy to help. Feel free to contact Dennis Oud, Tessa Sipkema, Elke Hofman-Bijvank, or Noa Bilogrevic. 

View the bill and its explanatory notes here. 

Firing an employee on the spot for using ChatGPT on a work laptop? That might sound harsh, but legally, it’s not that simple. And that’s exactly where things went wrong in this case.

In this ruling by the Zeeland-West-Brabant District Court, the case involved an employee on sick leave who had, among other things, entered search queries via ChatGPT on his company laptop regarding dismissal and potential severance pay. The employer, along with other allegations, saw this as grounds for immediate dismissal. But the district court judge drew a clear line through that.

Why? Because private use of the laptop was apparently not prohibited. The employer had not indicated anywhere that this was prohibited, so the labor court judge assumed that private use of the laptop was permitted. The use of ChatGPT was therefore not automatically a misuse of company resources. Nor was it shown that confidential company information had been shared. This made this aspect, at most, a minor offense, but not serious enough to warrant immediate dismissal. 

The most important lesson for employers, however, lies elsewhere. In the termination letter, the employer had listed seven reasons without making it clear that each of those reasons could, on its own, justify immediate termination. Legally, this constitutes a composite cause for immediate termination. Consequently, all seven elements must be proven. That did not happen. As a result, the immediate termination was overturned. Sometimes, therefore, the greatest risk lies not in the behavior itself, but in how the termination letter sets the case in motion.

What can employers learn from this?

1. Formulate the grounds for dismissal very precisely and strategically;
2. make it clear that the behaviors mentioned, both individually and collectively, constitute grounds for immediate dismissal; 
3. do not list too many allegations at once unless each point can be firmly substantiated;
4. clearly define in your policies what is and is not permitted regarding company resources, including for personal use. 

Not sure whether a termination letter, IT policy, or protocol is legally sound? In that case, a quick review beforehand is often more cost-effective than litigation later on. Please feel free to contact Dennis Oud, Tessa Sipkema, Elke Hofman-Bijvank and Noa Bilogrevic, and for more information.