In a ruling today (July 15), the European Union court said the companies may ban Muslim employees from wearing a headscarf under certain conditions. The EU court gave this ruling in two cases brought by Muslim women in Germany who were suspended from their jobs for wearing veil.
The issue of the hijab, the traditional headscarf worn around the head and shoulders, has caused controversy across Europe for years. In the cases brought to court, both Muslim women — a special-needs carer at a childcare centre in Hamburg run by a charitable association, and a cashier at the Mueller drugstore chain — did not wear headscarves when they started in their jobs, but decided to do so years later after coming back from parental leave.
They were told that this was not allowed and were at different points either suspended, told to come to work without it or put on a different job.
The EU court had to decide in both cases whether headscarf bans at work represented a violation of the freedom of religion or were allowed as part of the freedom to conduct a business and the wish to project an image of neutrality to customers.
Its response was that such bans were possible if justified by an employer’s need to present a neutral image.
