As in North America, the principle of pay equity between men and women is the rule of law in Europe. Official recognition of the principle comes from Article 119 of the Treaty of Rome (the European equivalent of the U.S. Constitution and Canadian Charter) which states that “men and women should receive equal pay for equal work.”

But until 1990, many employers treated the concept of “pay” as applying only to wages and salaries.

Ironically, the case that challenged this narrow reading of Article 119 was filed by a man. Douglas Harvey Barber worked for the insurer Guardian Royal Exchange (GRE) and was a member of the GRE pension plan. Pensionable age, i.e., the age members first qualified for retirement benefits, was 62 for men and 57 for women. If employees became “redundant” before that, they’d start receiving benefits at age 55 if they were male and 50 if they were female.

Mr. Harvey became redundant at age 52. A female employee in his position would have received pension benefits right away; but because he was male, Mr. Harvey had to wait 3 more years. He claimed that the policy violated the right to equal pay guaranteed by Article 119.

On this date in 1990, the European Court of Justice ruled that equality of pay applies not just to wages but to retirement benefits as well. Providing an immediate pension to a female while deferring it for a male simply on the basis of gender was a violation of Article 119, said the Court [Barber v. Guardian Royal Exchange Assurance Group, Case 262/88, [1990] IRLR 240].

The Barber case was a landmark ruling in European law. In 1999, the European Community adopted an updated version of the Rome treaty called the Treaty of Amsterdam that specifically spelled out that a job classification system used to determine pay must incorporate criteria that treat men and women equally. 

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