The direct effect of the EU Charter of Fundamental Rights in the Max Planck case before the ECJ

The right to a period of paid annual leave, affirmed for every worker by Article 31(2) of the Charter is, as regards its very existence, both mandatory and unconditional in nature, the unconditional nature not needing to be given concrete expression by provisions of EU or national law, which are only required to specify the exact duration of annual leave and, where appropriate, certain conditions for the exercise of that right. In the event that it is impossible to interpret national legislation in a manner consistent with the Article 31(2) of the Charter of Fundamental Rights, it follows from the latter provision that a national court hearing a dispute between a worker and his former employer who is a private individual must disapply the national legislation. In this regard, it should be noted that, although Article 51(1) of the Charter states that the provisions thereof are addressed to the institutions, bodies, offices and agencies of the European Union with due regard for the principle of subsidiarity and to the Member States only when they are implementing EU law, Article 51(1) does not, however, address the question whether those individuals may, where appropriate, be directly required to comply with certain provisions of the Charter and cannot, accordingly, be interpreted as meaning that it would systematically preclude such a possibility.