Homophobic Statements and Hypothetical Discrimination: Expanding the Scope of Directive 2000/78/EC: ECJ 23 April 2020, Case C-507/18, Associazione Avvocatura per i diritti LGBTI

In its judgment on the case of Rete Lenford, the Court of Justice addressed for the third time the issue of discriminatory statements, this time pronounced by an Italian lawyer against homosexual people. The Court built on the principles elaborated in the cases of Feryn and Asociația Accept, to declare that the prohibition against discrimination contained in the Framework Directive applies also to declarations made in contexts where there is no recruitment procedure in place, provided that there is a non-hypothetical link with the employer’s recruitment policy. This comment focuses on the enforcement of EU equality law in the national context, arguing that the case is an example of three parallel processes: the institutionalization, the proceduralization, and the expansion of EU Equality law.