2014Na1588 Compensation for Damages

A person shall be appointed.

A person shall be appointed.

Law Firm Jinsu (U.S.)

[Defendant-Appellee]

Seoul Western District Court Decision 2010Da55180 Decided May 6, 2011

Seoul Western District Court Decision 201145695 Decided November 18, 2011

Supreme Court Decision 2011Da109531 Decided February 27, 2014

June 10, 2014

July 11, 2014

1. The plaintiff's appeal is dismissed.

2. The costs of appeal shall be borne by the Plaintiff.

The judgment of the first instance shall be revoked. The defendant shall be KRW 15,697,320 and the complaint of this case against the plaintiff.

The amount of money shall be paid at the rate of 20% per annum from the day after the delivery date of the duplicate to the day of full payment.

1. Determination as to the cause of claim

A. The plaintiff's assertion

In a collective agreement concluded between the Plaintiff and the Defendant, “the Corporation provides offices for partnership activities.” This should be interpreted to mean not only the provision of partnership offices, but also the payment of electricity charges. Even if not, the Plaintiff and the Defendant should be deemed to have established a practice of providing electricity charges. However, even if the Plaintiff and the Defendant are obligated to pay electricity charges for the Plaintiff’s partnership offices in accordance with the collective agreement or established practice, the Defendant did not perform such duty, and the Plaintiff paid electricity charges of KRW 15,697,320 in total to the Korea Electric Power Corporation from December 2009 to January 201, thereby directly paying electricity charges of KRW 15,697,320 in total to the Korea Electric Power Corporation. Accordingly, the Defendant is liable to pay the Plaintiff, as compensation for damages incurred as above, the Defendant is obligated to pay electricity charges of KRW 15,697,320 in lieu of the Defendant.

B. Determination

(1) A disposition document should be reasonably interpreted in accordance with logical and empirical rules by comprehensively taking into account the contents of the language and text, the motive and background leading up to the agreement, the purpose to be achieved by the agreement, the genuine intent of the parties, etc. in a case where the interpretation of the parties’ intentions expressed in the document is at issue as to the interpretation of the text and text of the document, barring any special circumstances where the authenticity is acknowledged. In addition, in order to ensure that a specific practice existing in the inside of the company constitutes the content of a labor contract, it shall be clearly approved as a normative fact regulating the labor relationship in the corporate society, or it shall be accepted as a matter of course without raising any objection, and thus, it shall be supported by the normative formula to the extent that it can be established as a de facto system within the company (see Supreme Court Decision 2005Da7249, May 10, 2007; Supreme Court Decision 201Da52715, Apr. 23, 2002).

① On April 1, 2006, the Plaintiff and the Defendant concluded on April 1, 200, Articles 13(1) and 5 of the former Collective Agreement.

14. Article 11(1) of the Labor Union and Labor Relations Adjustment Act provides that "the Corporation shall provide an office for union activities," and there is no provision on operating expenses, such as electricity charges. On the other hand, Article 81(4) of the Trade Union and Labor Relations Adjustment Act prohibits a user's act of assisting union operating expenses as an unfair labor practice, and Article 90 provides that criminal punishment shall also be imposed on a person who fails to provide an office for union activities.

1. ② Since 1945, the Plaintiff, whose members are employees, provided a trade union office to the Plaintiff after the establishment of the Plaintiff, the Defendant’s general railroad office, at the time of providing the Plaintiff with the electricity rates for the use of electrical facilities ancillary to the Plaintiff. However, there is no explicit agreement between the Plaintiff and the Korea Railroad. In addition, in the case of the Plaintiff’s netcheon Regional Headquarters Office, where the electric meters are installed separately from the beginning, the Plaintiff voluntarily paid the electricity rates without any objection in the process of the Defendant’s measure as follows: (4) In light of the fact that the Plaintiff’s net local headquarters office, where the electric meters are installed separately from the beginning, it is difficult to pay the electricity rates of the association office due to the failure to install a separate electric meters in the partnership office,

③ However, upon the enactment of the Korea Railroad Corporation Act, the Korea Railroad Corporation was converted to the Defendant on January 1, 2005. Accordingly, the Defendant’s payment of electricity charges from the Defendant’s own budget, instead of the State’s budget, and the Defendant’s burden of electricity charges at the office of a trade union as a result of the comprehensive audit implemented around April 2009 was pointed out that it may constitute an unfair labor practice that assists the operating expenses of the trade union under Article 81 subparag. 4 of the Trade Union and Labor Relations Adjustment Act, and the Ministry of Labor asked questions to the Ministry of Labor. On July 7, 2009, the Minister of Labor responded to the purport that an employer’s act of subsidizing electricity charges required for the operation of a trade union office in accordance with a collective agreement constitutes unfair labor practice

④ On July 31, 2009, the Defendant notified the Plaintiff that he would not bear electricity charges in the future because it may constitute unfair labor practices. Since around that time, the Defendant tried to apply for the change of electricity usage agreements to Korea Electric Power Corporation’s respective offices for change of the name of the payer of electricity charges, but the Defendant’s payment of electricity charges from December 2009 to the Plaintiff’s office did not return the electricity charges. (3) Examining the literal meaning of the above collective agreement provisions, the contents of the Trade Union and Labor Relations Adjustment Act, the circumstance leading up to the change of the electricity charges by the Defendant into a public corporation, and the circumstance leading up to the change of the office charges by the Plaintiff and the Defendant’s submission of the above collective agreement to the extent that it is difficult to interpret that the Plaintiff’s submission of the above collective agreement regulations to the extent that it was not consistent with the Plaintiff’s duty to provide the office charges to the Plaintiff and its submission of the foregoing office charges to the Plaintiff’s respective employees of the labor union and its submission of such regulations to the same extent as the Defendant’s submission of the foregoing office charges.

2. Conclusion

The plaintiff's claim of this case is dismissed as it is without merit, and the judgment of the court of first instance is just, and the plaintiff's appeal is dismissed and it is so decided as per Disposition.

Judges Lee Jae-soo

Judges Lee Jin-jin

Judges Kim Jong-san