The prohibition of discrimination of third-country nationals within Maltese and European employment legislation

Abstract

European Citizens, by virtue of their citizenship enjoy a vast spectrum of rights including that of non-discrimination. TCNs, on the other hand, do not hold EU citizenship and yet the EU has progressively moved to approximate the rights of TCNs with those of EU citizens. EU Law recognises the principle of equality before the law and protection against discrimination as a universal right. The principle of non-discrimination is a central aspect of the fabric of the EU legal order and is a feature of the Racial Equality Directive and the Employment Equality Framework Directive, which provided protection on an extensive set of grounds, with the exception of nationality. This exception is a reflection on Member States’ unwillingness to give up sovereignty over their immigration policy. The application of these Directives results in a hierarchy emerging from the diverging material scope of the Directives. Another hierarchy in place in the European framework is that concerning TCNs legal status. This ties together conditions of admission to the EU, and access to equal treatment rights. The introduction of the Single Permit Directive was the EU’s response to the patchwork of Directives regulating labour migration however the several exclusions from its scope mean that it falls short of guaranteeing a common set of rights with no exceptions.