Finite, Not Fleeting: Court of Appeal Clarifies ‘Temporary’ Agency Work and Agency-Employer Status
Commentary on Lutz v Ryanair DAC & Anor [2025] EWCA Civ 849

1. Introduction

The Court of Appeal’s decision in Lutz v Ryanair DAC & Storm Global Ltd radically refines two recurring puzzles in UK labour law:

• Who is the real “employer” where a worker is hired through a service-company/agency but works day-to-day for an end user?
• What does “supplied … to work temporarily” mean under the Agency Workers Regulations 2010 (AWR)? Does a five-year assignment fall inside or outside the regime?

Captain Jason Lutz, a Boeing 737 pilot, worked for Ryanair between 2018 and 2020 under a chain of contracts with an intermediary (Storm Global, formerly MCG Aviation). After dismissal he brought:

1. An “Annual Leave Claim” against Storm under the Civil Aviation (Working Time) Regulations 2004 (CAWTR).
2. An “Equal Terms Claim” against both Storm and Ryanair under the AWR for parity with directly-employed pilots.

Both claims succeeded before the Employment Tribunal and the Employment Appeal Tribunal. Ryanair and Storm’s further appeals were dismissed, creating a Court of Appeal precedent of immediate significance for airlines and the wider agency sector.

2. Summary of the Judgment

The Court (Underhill, Males and Elisabeth Laing LJJ) held:

• Employer for CAWTR purposes – In a tripartite arrangement the agency (Storm) remained the pilot’s employer even though Ryanair exercised day-to-day control. Contractual clarity and established “agency worker” jurisprudence meant there was no justification for implying an employment relationship between the pilot and Ryanair.
• Meaning of “temporarily” in AWR regulation 3(1)(a) – “Temporary” contrasts with “permanent/indefinite”. It simply denotes finite duration, however long, and is not limited to short-term or casual cover. A single five-year fixed-term assignment is therefore “temporary”.
• Result – Lutz was (i) a “crew member employed by [Storm]” under CAWTR, and (ii) an “agency worker” supplied temporarily to Ryanair. Both appeals failed; 27 stayed pilot claims can now proceed.

3. Analysis

3.1 Precedents Cited and Their Influence

• James v LB Greenwich [2008] – Leading domestic authority on when an implied contract with an end-user may arise. Underhill LJ treated it as decisive: if the express contracts explain the working arrangement, no employment contract with the end-user need be implied.
• Allonby C-256/01; Ruhrlandklinik C-216/15; and LM (Omnitel) C-441/23 – CJEU cases confirming agency workers can have an employment relationship with the agency alone even where the end-user directs work.
• Moran EAT 2013; Brooknight EAT 2018; Angard Staffing EAT 2020 – Domestic trilogy interpreting “supplied … to work temporarily”. Court of Appeal endorsed Moran’s binary distinction: fixed-term = temporary; indefinite = permanent.
• KG C-681/18; Daimler C-232/20; ALB C-427/21 – CJEU emphasis that agency work must remain “temporary, transitional or limited in time” and Member States must curb abusive successive assignments. Used to rebut Ryanair’s “short-term only” argument.
• Uber v Aslam [2021] – Cited by Storm for the control/subordination test. Court held the case is a “red herring” where worker status itself is undisputed.

3.2 Legal Reasoning Unpacked

1. Tripartite Employment Logic (CAWTR)
   • Lutz had a written Service Agreement with MCG/Storm creating mutual obligations and remuneration.
   • No contract existed between him and Ryanair.
   • EU concept of “worker” allows direction/control to sit with the end-user while the agency remains employer (Allonby; Omnitel).
   • Applying James, there was no need to imply a Ryanair contract.
2. Definition of “Temporarily” (AWR)
   • Statutory text, recitals to the Agency Workers Directive 2008/104, and CJEU cases show a policy contrast between “indefinite” and “finite” work.
   • Singh J in Moran accurately captured this: temporary = terminable on a condition (fixed date/event), not necessarily short.
   • The Court rejected Ryanair’s attempt to import a “short-term” gloss – that would leave a protection gap for medium/long fixed terms and contradict EU jurisprudence.
3. Evidence of a Fixed Term
   • Service Agreement expressly ran for five years, renewable only by a fresh contract.
   • Pilot’s unawareness of any automatic renewal practice and repeated requests for permanent employment reinforced the finite nature of the posting.
4. No Conflict with Practical Rostering
   • Full-year rostering did not convert the finite assignment into an indefinite one. Usage intensity is irrelevant; the question is how long the right/duty to supply lasts, not how busy the worker is during that time.

3.3 Expected Impact

The ruling reverberates well beyond the aviation industry:

• Agency sector – Long fixed-term postings (e.g., IT consultants on three-year projects, security staff on Olympics-length contracts) now clearly fall within AWR protection.
• Group companies & insourcing models – Confirms that where an intra-group “service company” hires staff who work under another entity’s control, that staff remain employees of the service company for working-time purposes.
• Drafting of contracts – Employers/agents must revisit term clauses. Labelling an arrangement “self-employed” or “independent” will not defeat worker status; but specifying an indefinite term may exclude AWR rights (though raises redundancy/unfair dismissal risks later).
• Litigation pipeline – 27 stayed pilot claims will resume; similar claims in other airlines and sectors likely.
• Legislative clarity – Judgment highlights inconsistency between Working Time Regulations 1998 reg 36 (protecting some agency workers) and CAWTR (none). May prompt regulatory tidying.

4. Complex Concepts Simplified

• Tripartite Arrangement – A three-party set-up: Worker (A) is employed by Agency (B) but physically works for and under the control of Hirer/Client (C).
• CAWTR vs. WTR – The Civil Aviation Working Time rules are a specialist offshoot of general Working Time rules, tailored to flight crew. Rights (annual leave, maximum 900 flying hours) mirror the general regime but use aviation terminology.
• Agency Worker – Defined in AWR as someone supplied temporarily to work for a hirer and who has any form of contract (employment or personal-service) with the agency.
• Temporary vs. Permanent – Temporary = ends on a date/event (fixed term); Permanent = open-ended until notice is given.
• Successive Assignments Abuse – EU law obliges states to stop chains of renewals designed to dodge equal-treatment rules, e.g., by imposing caps like 18 months (Germany) or converting status to permanent (UK does so for fixed-term employment, not yet for agency work).

5. Conclusion

The Court of Appeal has drawn two bright lines. First, in specialist working-time regimes the agency that pays and contracts with the worker is the employer, even when operational control sits elsewhere. Second, “temporary” in the AWR refers to any finite, non-open-ended assignment, however lengthy. By rejecting arguments centred on practical control and assignment length, the Court restores coherence to a body of law straddling domestic and EU roots and ensures that large cohorts of agency workers—pilots, offshore engineers, IT consultants—remain within the protective umbrella Parliament intended.

Practitioners should audit agency arrangements with these clarifications in mind, revisit contractual terms to ensure they reflect the parties’ real intentions, and expect a rise in equal-treatment and working-time claims where long-term but fixed assignments persist.