Fired Worker Unaware of Pregnancy Achieves Job Security and Full Compensation; Understanding of the Superior Court of Justice (STJ) Gains Strength in New Rulings

Written by Valdemar Medeiros

Published on 09/10/2025 at 14:18

Foto: Trabalhadora demitida sem saber que estava grávida conquista estabilidade e indenização total; entendimento do TST volta a ganhar força em novos julgamentos

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Even Without Communicating the Pregnancy, Dismissed Pregnant Employee Has Right to Stability and Full Compensation, According to Consolidated Understanding of the TST and STF.

The Superior Labor Court (TST) has once again applied one of the most consolidated understandings of Brazilian Labor Law: a pregnant employee dismissed without knowing she was pregnant has the right to provisional stability and full compensation. The decision reinforces a constitutional principle that protects motherhood and the unborn, even when the employer is unaware of the pregnancy at the time of dismissal.

The guarantee is provided for in the Article 10, Section II, Item “b”, of the Act of Transitional Constitutional Provisions (ADCT), which prohibits arbitrary dismissal of pregnant women from conception until five months after childbirth.

Recent Case Reinforced the Topic in the Courts

The case analyzed by the TST (RR-1000904-94.2021.5.02.0471) involved a worker dismissed without just cause, who only discovered her pregnancy weeks after the termination.

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Constitutional Basis and Consolidated Understanding

The decision follows what is already fully consolidated in the Brazilian legal system. The STF, in 2018, ruled on Extraordinary Appeal No. 629.053 (Theme 497), with general repercussions, establishing the thesis that the pregnant woman’s stability is independent of the prior knowledge of the employer or the pregnant woman herself.

The TST reaffirms this understanding in Summary 244, which expressly states:

“The employer’s ignorance of the pregnant state does not preclude the right to payment of compensation arising from the stability.”

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These two provisions — the ADCT and Summary 244 — are today the main legal references applied in all labor courts in the country.

What the Decision Represents for Workers and Companies

With the already consolidated understanding, any dismissal without just cause of a pregnant employee is considered null, even if no one was aware of the pregnancy.

In this case, the Labor Court determines that the company reinstates the employee or pays full compensation for the stability period, including:

Full salaries and benefits for the entire period;
Proportional thirteenth salary;
Vacation and FGTS;
Termination fine, if applicable.

For companies, the warning is clear: protection of maternity is objective, not depending on formal communication. This means that inadvertently dismissing a pregnant employee can lead to significant retroactive costs, even months after the termination.

The Principle of Protection of Maternity

The main foundation of this guarantee is social and constitutional: to protect the woman, the baby, and the family unit from economic instability during the most sensitive period of pregnancy.

When judging the topic with general repercussions, the Supreme Federal Court emphasized that the right exists “to prevent harm to the mother and the unborn child, ensuring minimum subsistence and human dignity.”

Therefore, the right to stability for the pregnant employee does not result from the relationship between employee and employer, but rather from a higher constitutional value, related to the protection of motherhood and childhood.

The case reinforces that, in Brazil, the protection of pregnant women is among the broadest in the world.
Even if neither the company nor the employee knows about the pregnancy, the judiciary understands that stability is automatic from conception. Thus, the TST and STF maintain a jurisprudence that guarantees legal security to workers and reinforces the social function of employment.

Fired Worker Unaware of Pregnancy Achieves Job Security and Full Compensation; Understanding of the Superior Court of Justice (STJ) Gains Strength in New Rulings

Even Without Communicating the Pregnancy, Dismissed Pregnant Employee Has Right to Stability and Full Compensation, According to Consolidated Understanding of the TST and STF.

Recent Case Reinforced the Topic in the Courts

Constitutional Basis and Consolidated Understanding

What the Decision Represents for Workers and Companies

The Principle of Protection of Maternity

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Fired Worker Unaware of Pregnancy Achieves Job Security and Full Compensation; Understanding of the Superior Court of Justice (STJ) Gains Strength in New Rulings

Even Without Communicating the Pregnancy, Dismissed Pregnant Employee Has Right to Stability and Full Compensation, According to Consolidated Understanding of the TST and STF.

Recent Case Reinforced the Topic in the Courts

Constitutional Basis and Consolidated Understanding

What the Decision Represents for Workers and Companies

The Principle of Protection of Maternity

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Austrian engineers have developed an inflatable concrete technology that transforms flat slabs into domes using only air pressure, eliminating scaffolding and temporary forms, and potentially changing the way bridges, tunnels, and curved roofs are constructed worldwide.

A robot named Walter does the work of five bricklayers per hour and can save the construction industry, where the average age of professionals is 46 years and almost no one wants to learn the trade anymore, in the United Kingdom.

Spain installs two giant pipelines 2.2 km off the coast to draw water from the Mediterranean and supply a megafacility capable of producing 200 million liters of drinking water per day.

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