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ARTICLE · 06 MAY 2026

New Supreme Court Judgment: ‘negligible Scale’ As A Quantitative Threshold In Scope-of-application Provisions?

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The Dutch Supreme Court has ruled on a fundamental question in pension law: can a company be required to participate in an industry-wide pension fund if it performs only minimal activities within that industry's scope?

NetherlandsEmployment and HR
Robert Goedhart
Robert Goedhart
Mathieu Halsema
Mathieu Halsema

On 22 May 2026, the Dutch Supreme Court (Hoge Raad) once again handed down an important judgment (ECLI:NL:HR:2026:795) concerning the interpretation of scope-of-application provisions in mandatory industry-wide (collective labour agreement and pension) regulations. The central question: must a company in which activities belonging to a particular industry are carried out only on a ‘negligible scale’ participate in the industry-wide pension fund associated with that industry, simply because the relevant (ministerial) mandatory participation decree contains no explicit ‘principal criterion’? The Supreme Court answers that question in the negative in this case but does so on different grounds than the Court of Appeal in the (annulled) preceding judgment.

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