Labour, more disputes on civil service and dismissals

To the 317,000 contentious proceedings must then be added the preventive technical assessments, which are compulsory in disputes concerning invalidity pensions and other social security cases where a medical requirementmust be ascertained. These special proceedings amounted to 208,750 in 2025, 17.3% more than in 2019.

The ministerial monitoring also makes it possible to note which courts are more involved in certain matters. The Court of Rome, for example, is the first for the number of new welfare and social security cases (6,268), followed by Naples, Palermo, Lecce and Taranto. For labour cases in the private sector, the record is held by Milan, which registered almost 6,700, up 22% compared to pre-Covid. The Naples office is the one that registered the highest number of new labour disputes in the public sector, with over 6,000 in 2025, compared to 1,252 in 2019.

"There has been an increase in the number of appeals of dismissals with a request for reinstatement under Article 441-bis of the Code of Civil Procedure, which require priority handling over other cases," explains the president of the labour section of the Court of Milan, Paola Ghinoy. 'The increase in labour and welfare proceedings,' she continues, 'has been constant in recent years and is continuing in the first months of 2026. From January to April last year, a total of 3,913 new cases were registered, 367 of which were appeals of dismissals under Article 441-bis. In the same period of 2026, there were 4,466 new cases, 504 of them appeals of dismissals'.

Also at theCourt of Naples, the increase in new proceedings continues in 2026. According to the latest data provided by the Court, in the first quarter of this year, there were 2,185 civil service cases arising, an increase of 15.3% compared to the same period in 2025. They represent more than a quarter of the total labour and welfare cases that came before the Court in the first three months of 2026, which, however, includes not only actual litigation, but also injunctions, precautionary proceedings and preventive technical assessments.

Moreover, among the new civil service cases in Naples, almost 37 per cent come from the school sector. "The litigation linked to the teacher's card has not been exhausted," explains Paolo Coppola, president of the third labour section of the Court of Naples. "It has been recognised for precarious annual staff, but it needs to be clarified to what extent it is due to those who have short substitutions, given the ruling of the EU Court of Justice. There are also numerous cases brought byprecarious teachers for holidays not taken during the year'. In addition to schools, there is health care, with lawsuits initiated by staff against the health care companies, especially for holiday and shift allowances and benefits. 'But here,' says Coppola, 'we are doing a lot of settlements'. In the future, he reasons, 'civil service litigation could increase even more, fuelled by some of the rules of dubious Euro-union compatibility introduced or confirmed with the last round of contract renewals'.

Public employment disputes also weigh heavily in Milan: "Public employment lawsuits have increased a lot in recent years," confirms President Ghinoy. "These are disputes coming from the school, mainly from fixed-term teachers who ask to be put on an equal footing with permanent ones on holidays or on the teacher's charter, but also from the health sector and from local authority employees, mainly for questions of recalculation of pay institutes. The increase in litigation,' he adds, 'is not, however, matched by an increase in resources. We are concerned about theoverlaps in administrative staff, caused by the failure to replace those who are retiring and by the imminent expiry of contracts for officials in the trial office'.