FRANCE

Foreign Firms’ In-House Communications and Technical Documents Must be in French

--By Philippe Desprès, Gide Loyrette Nouel, Paris, France (despres@gide.com)

Firms operating in France are obligated to translate into French " all technical documents relating to manufactured products present on the French market, as well as those that the company will produce for the French market, as necessary for French employees to satisfactorily carry out their work in France", the French Court of Appeal of Versailles decided March 2, 2006 (Versailles Court of Appeal, Decision n°127 of March 2, 2006, R.G. n°05/01344, GE Medical Systems vs. GE Medical Systems SCS Works Council) The decision, interpreting Article L.122-39-1 of the French Labor Code, upheld a lower court’s earlier decision.

The Versailles Court of Appeal ordered GE Healthcare to pay the plaintiffs—trade unions and the other organizations representing French workers—€580,000 (approximately $689,920), and in addition imposed fines of €20,000 a day for failure to provide the translations within three months.

The company is currently considering appealing the decision to the French Supreme Court. The decision is the first time a French court has enforced legislation regarding the use of the French language, known as the "Toubon Act" of August 4, 1994. The principle established by the Versailles Court of Appeal (namely that documents that are necessary for French employees to satisfactorily carry out their work in France must be translated to French) likely will result in further litigation. Following the decision, several union representatives interested in commencing similar proceedings against other companies contacted the GE Healthcare staff representatives.

The case at issue has a long history. For over ten years, union representatives of the General Electrics Medical Systems (GEMS) group subsidiary, GE Healthcare (located in Buc, near Paris), had asked the company to translate certain documents from English into French, in particular documents concerning technical security instructions for sophisticated devices. Following GE Healthcare’s repeated refusal to have the documents translated, the Health, Safety and Working Conditions Committee and the Works Council decided to commence proceedings against the company. Ultimately they filed suit with the Civil Court of Versailles (Tribunal de grande instance de Versailles) on June 24, 2004, asking that the company be ordered to comply with the obligations contained in Article L.122-39-1 of the French Labor Code, which provides that “ any document that contains obligations for the employee or provisions whose knowledge is necessary for the performance of one’s work must be drafted in French. Translations into one or more foreign languages can be provided. These provisions do not apply to documents coming from abroad or intended for foreigners”.

The Civil Court of Versailles was asked to rule whether the provisions of Article L.122-39-1 of the Labor Code applied to GE Healthcare documents or whether these documents were covered by the exception provided for by Article L.122-39-1 paragraph 2 of the Labor Code regarding “documents coming from abroad or intended for foreigners".

The trade unions and staff representatives sued GE Healthcare for its refusal to translate these documents not only because it violated the rules on the use of the French language and French labor law, but also because the company’s refusal resulted, in their opinion, in workers who did not speak English being totally marginalized. A requirement that workers speak English can be discriminatory, they maintained. The use of the English language in companies such as GE Healthcare can prevent workers who do not speak English from being adequately informed, and moreover, such a requirement also hinders their chances of promotion.

The Civil Court of Versailles, following a strict interpretation of the Labor Code, on January 11, 2005, ordered GE Healthcare to immediately provide its employees with (i) a French translation of its software and (ii) a French translation of documents relating to employee training, safety and health instructions and training manuals. In addition, the court ordered the company to have documents relating to products already on the market translated into French by June 1, 2005, with a daily penalty for non-compliance of €20,000 (approximately $23,790) per document.

GE Healthcare’s appeal argued that documents were sourced outside of France and were generally intended for non-French employees. The company reiterated its position that the exception set out by Article L.122-39-1 paragraph 2 of the Labor Code was applicable.