Duty to pay salaries during lay-off processes

Supreme Court judgment 31 January 2019, HR-2019-178-A, (case no. 18-163837SIV-HRET), civil case, appeal against judgment.

Transocean Offshore (North Sea) Ltd. (advokat Pål Tangen), (Assisting counsel Voggi Bondi) v. John Håkon Larsen (Counsel Bent Endresen), Industri Energi (third-party intervener) (Counsel Eyvind Mossige)

Justices: Matningsdal, Møse, Normann, Ringnes, Lindsetmo

A recipient of redundancy pay under sections 3 and 4 of the Redundancy Pay Act of 6 May 1988 no. 22, had had his salary reduced during the employer-financed period to 6 G – six times the basic national insurance contribution. The Supreme Court found like the lower instances that no such reduction can be made, but that the employee is entitled to full salary during this period. The reference in section 4 of the Redundancy Pay Act to section 8-28 of the National Insurance Act, which in turn refers to section 8-10, did not entail that the reduction to 6 G under section 10 subsection 2 of the National Insurance Act was applicable when calculating the redundancy pay. This followed from a textual analysis of the Act, and the preparatory works did not suggest otherwise.