Judgment_paragraph 51 · European Commission v Hungary (C-286/12)

51The disputed national measures, pursuant to which the fact that a worker has reached the retirement age laid down by that legislation leads to automatic termination of his employment contract, must be regarded as directly imposing less favourable treatment of workers who have reached that age as compared with all other persons in the labour force. Such legislation therefore establishes a difference in treatment directly based on age, as referred to in Article 2(1) and (2)(a) of Directive 2000/78 (see, to that effect, Case C-411/05 Palacios de la Villa [2007] ECR I-8531, paragraph 51).