Tom Messiaen

Tom Messiaen is active in social law (individual and collective labour law, social security and international employment), statutory employment and social criminal law.

He holds a Master’s Degree in Law (Ghent University, 1994) and taught Labour Law at the Masters in Business à Communication UG-HOG until 2010 and has been appointed as an academic consultant within the Department of Criminal Law and Social Law UG. He also followed the management course ‘Compensation & Benefits Management’ at the Vlerick Management School in 2012.

Tom Messiaen has been a member of the Ghent Bar since 1994. He was a founding partner of the association De Schrijver Van de Gehuchte Messiaen, which merged with Monard Law on 1 September 2008. He leads the Ghent practice group ‘social law’.

Since 2006, he has been included in the Legal 500 every year as a Belgian leading lawyer in the field of employment in the European Legal Experts and as a specialist in social criminal law. He is a much sought-after speaker for guest lectures and seminars in his field and regularly contributes to the publication of various books and articles. Topics include false self-employment, checks by social inspection and criminal prosecution, privacy in the employment relationship, social law in the event of a takeover, and the legal status regulation of civil servants. He is also active in various editorial boards including ‘Sociale Kronieken’, ‘Tijdschrift voor Gentse en West-Vlaamse rechtspraak’ and ‘RAGB’.

Tom has been a deputy judge at the Ghent Labour Court since 2001 and an expert at the Advisory Council on Social Criminal Law since 2016, which watches over social criminal law and provides legislative recommendations.

Tom has been recognized as a lawyer in Cassation Proceedings in Criminal Matters since 2016.

Download Tom’s cv here. 

Download Tom’s academic bibliography here.