On 12 March 2026, the Paris civil court found the French beauty brand Yves Rocher liable for failing in its duty of vigilance regarding its activities in Turkey, specifically anti-unionisation practices. Following a membership campaign launched in January 2018 by the Petrol-Is trade union among the workers of Yves Rocher’s Turkish subsidiary, which led to the recognition of the union representativeness within the subsidiary (157 workers out of 379), in May 2018, a major wave of dismissals was carried out, with 132 employees fired; a retaliation against unionised workers.
In this unprecedent ruling, the court confirmed that the Duty of Vigilance Law applies to the activities of French companies’ subsidiaries operating abroad and ordered the company to compensate some employees. However, due to a restrictive interpretation of an agreement reached between the Turkish subsidiary and employees by the court, most plaintiffs’ claim for compensation was considered inadmissible, highly limiting Yves Rocher’s accountability and access to remedy for claimants.
The extraterritorial applicability of the Duty of Vigilance Law
As the issue at stake had occurred in Turkey, Yves Rocher argued that the applicable law to the case should be Turkish law (§27). The company also claimed that the French legislator did not provide any indication on the extraterritorial scope of the Duty of Vigilance Law (§28).
While under Article 4 of the Rome II Regulation “the law applicable to a non-contractual obligation arising out of a tort/delict shall be the law of the country in which the damage occurs irrespective of the country in which the event giving rise to the damage occurred and irrespective of the country or countries in which the indirect consequences of that event occur” (§47), Article 16 of that Regulation provides an exception for overriding mandatory provisions, stating that “Nothing in this Regulation shall restrict the application of the provisions of the law of the forum in a situation where they are mandatory irrespective of the law otherwise applicable to the non-contractual obligation” (§48).
Referring to the jurisprudence of the European Court of Justice in relation to the interpretation of the notion of overriding mandatory provisions (§52) as well as the definition of overriding mandatory provisions provided in Article 9 of the Rome 1 Regulation (§53), “it is for national courts in assessing whether a national law constitutes overriding mandatory provisions to consider not only the precise terms of that law, but also its overall structure and all the circumstances in which it was adopted, in order to conclude that it is mandatory, insofar as it appears that the national legislature adopted it to protect an interest deemed essential by the State” (§54).
Therefore, the court had to determine whether the Duty of Vigilance Law constituted overriding mandatory provisions which would then lead to its application instead of Turkish law (§58).
After recalling the context of the adoption of the law, the existence of non-binding international frameworks on corporate responsibility as well as the collapse of the Rana Plaza killing more than thousands garment workers working for international brands (§60), the court referred to the bill’s rational stating that “The aim is to hold transnational corporations accountable in order to prevent tragedies from occurring in France and abroad, and to obtain reparations for the victims in case of human rights and environmental damages.” (§61). “The rationale should lead us to understand this innovative text as an overriding mandatory law, so that French law can prevail over foreign law normally applicable to a contract, when it is more protective of the weaker party.” (§63).
The court concluded that the above elements made it clear that the national legislature had intended to give Article 2 of the Duty of Vigilance Law the status of an overriding mandatory provision to promote French companies’ responsible business conduct practices (§75).
Finally, regarding the limitation period to seek remedy, the court noted that the 5 years period started from the publication date of Yves Rocher’s vigilance plans, i.e. in June 2020 and not when employees were fired in 2018 as the claimants based their action on the company’s failure to comply with its obligations under the Duty of Vigilance Law (§88-89).
The formal notice
The issue of sending an appropriate formal notice has been a recurring point of debates since the first cases under the Duty of Vigilance Law have been filed in court (see here and here).
In this case, the court simply highlighted that the action on which it was called upon to rule was not for a request for an injunction (which requires sending a formal notice), but a request to seek remedy which does not require sending such notice (§128).
The failure to identify risks to employees’ rights in Turkey
According to the Turkish employees, Yves Rocher failed to take into account in its vigilance plans the analysis of human rights risks to employees related to the activities of its subsidiaries and therefore excluded its Turkish subsidiaries, omitting to engage with stakeholders and failed to consider multiple sources informing on the risk to employees’ rights in Turkey which Yves Rocher could not ignore (§131). Claimants argued that Yves Rocher’s vigilance plans should have contained a series of measures in relation to freedom of association and health and safety in accordance with Articles 16 and 19 of the International Labour Organisation (ILO) Convention n°155 (§133).
To its defence, the company explained that the 2017 and 2018 vigilance plans prioritised risks in its value chain, sub-contractors and suppliers, where the company deemed risks to be greater and that once those risks were addressed, the company included its own activities into the scope of the vigilance plan from 2019 onwards (§143). While the company acknowledged the exclusion of its subsidiaries in the first plan, Yves Rocher argued it had met the expectations of the law through an internal mechanism mentioned in its code of conduct communicated to all staff in its Turkish subsidiary in 2017 (§144).
The company also considered it had remediated to the situation as soon as it became aware of it in May 2018 through an on-site audit in July 2018 and by reorganising local management with the adoption of an action plan (§147). Finally, the company contested the causality link between the content of its vigilance plan and the workers’ rights violations (§150).
The court started by recalling that the aim of the measures contained in a vigilance plan is twofold: to identify risks related to the companies, including its subsidiaries, sub-contractors and suppliers and to prevent severe violations to human rights and fundamental freedoms, health and safety and the environment (§157). The court also recalled that mapping risks is the primary obligation, as it is a prerequisite for risks prevention and mitigation (§159).
The court noted that the methodology used for risk mapping is described in the 2017 and 2018 vigilance plans as being based on three criteria: activity risk, country risk, revenue risk in order to classify suppliers and define an assessment policy for each supplier (§167).
Despite the dismissal of Turkish workers in 2018, the court stressed that the 2018 vigilance plan kept excluding its subsidiaries from its scope (§171). According to the court “nothing in this case allows to understand the procedure or method used by Yves Rocher, by means of which it identified the relevant risks of its activity and those relating to its subsidiaries, in order to determine the information to be included in its vigilance plans for 2017 and 2018” (§173). This failing was further confirmed by the analysis of an external audit conducted in June 2020 which stated “The Rocher Group’s vigilance plan primarily addresses risk management within the supply chain, based on the premise that the Group’s operational and risks to third-party are lower. However, given the Group’s activities (direct sales, franchises), current events (the labor dispute in Turkey), and audit findings (the risk associated with the lack of permits to extract groundwater in Morocco) […], a formal vigilance plan covering the scope of the Group’s operations appears to be lacking.” (§174).
The court concluded that this failure in the risk mapping constituted a failure to comply with the Duty Vigilance Law and that neither a code of conduct nor corrective measures allegedly taken once violations occurred could replace the obligation of risk mapping (§176).
A restrictive interpretation of the agreement reached between the subsidiary and employees leading to limited compensation
72 claimants to the case received remediation through a settlement agreement signed with the subsidiary in 2019. Despite the fact that they claimed that the agreement was with the Turkish subsidiary, not the parent company, the defendant in this case, and that the agreement had a different purpose, the reintegration of the employees (and not the establishment of the civil liability of the parent company on the ground on the failure to comply with the Duty of Vigilance Law as in the present case) (§95-96), the court nevertheless deemed that their claims for compensation was inadmissible (§112-119) and that the 72 claimants lack of standing to be part in the case (§120). In particular, the court noted that “The provision of the agreement, formulated in general terms, by which the employees declare themselves to have received their rights and irrevocably declare that they release their employer, in terms of potential rights and claims in this procedure, and of all other claims related to the employment contract, clearly expresses that they admit that there is no longer any dispute between them and the subsidiary [emphasis added], and that their dispute is terminated.” (§118).
Such restrictive interpretation of the agreement is highly problematic as it restricts accountability of the parent company while limiting workers’ access to remedy. In fact, as highlighted by the claimants, and as per the terms of the agreement, such agreement was between the employees and the subsidiary only, and had a different subject than the case at stake. This agreement was reached after workers filed a case with the Gebze’s labour court and seek their reintegration under Turkish law (§115-116).
Following the court rationale, it would become extremely hard, if not impossible to hold parent companies liable for damage caused by their failure to comply with their obligations under the Duty of Vigilance Law, as soon as the entity causing the violation to human rights, fundamental freedoms, health and safety or the environment (be it a subsidiary, a sub-contractor or a supplier) would reach an agreement with the victims or would provide some type of remedy. Agreement or remedy provided by another entity than the parent company should not exonerate it from its own responsibility under civil liability where damage occurs as a result of its failure to comply with its own obligations.
The court nevertheless acknowledged the existence of personal damage for 6 employees (§177-204) as well as the causation link between Yves Rocher’s failure to comply with its obligations and the damage, opening right to compensation (§219). In particular, the court noted that back in 2012, prior to the acquisition of the Turkish subsidiary, a social audit conducted by an external party pointed out that “while stating that it was not an expert on the subject, it drew attention to the conditions of unionisation in Turkey, and the tendency of Turkish companies to avoid unionisation” (§210). Additionally, multiple sources, from the ILO to the UN Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination Against Women had provided information on the issue of union rights in Turkey (§212). Therefore, Yves Rocher ought to know the severity of human rights risks to Turkish employees in relation to trade union rights and could have prevented the dismissal of unionised employees (§218).
Conclusion
While this ruling is important as it confirmed that the Duty of Vigilance Law applies to the activities of French companies’ subsidiaries operating abroad, the exclusion of the vast majority of the claimants of the case on the ground that an agreement had been reached with the Turkish subsidiary raises serious question as to whether remediation can be accessible through civil liability even when failure to comply with the Duty of Vigilance Law, personal damage and causality could be established.