Czech Business Today

In November 2017, the Gothenburg Social Summit adopted the proclamation to the European Social Rights Pillar (EPSP). The proclamation is an intergovernmental agreement without legal obligation. Under EPSP, however, the European Commission is now coming up with major legislative proposals that do not respect the principles of subsidiarity and proportionality in many ways, challenge the drive for better regulation, disparate social dialogue, complicate life for businesses, and ultimately jeopardize job creation.

One of such legislative initiatives is the Commission proposal to repeal  Directive 91/533/EEC on the employer’s obligation to inform employees in writing of the terms and conditions of the employment contract and the employment relationship and replace it with a more complex one on working conditions based on article 153(1)(B) TFEU. This proposal is included in the EC work program for 2018.

The Directive 91/533 / EEC has passed the check of effectiveness of the legislation under REFIT with a positive result. The legislation of the Member State is highly consistent with the directive, the transposition deficiencies are minimal and the directive is considered to be relevant and important part of the EU legislation. The European social partners have not reached agreement on the opening of joint negotiations due to the different views on the scope of the modernization of the directive. The Commission therefore came up with its own proposal for a fundamental interference with the directive, which substantially extends the rights of employees and the obligations of employers. The Commission does not like the freedom of Member States to apply the definitions of “employee” and “employment relationship”. For the purpose of the revised directive, therefore, it proposes a universal definition of ‘worker’ so as to extend its scope to all types of employment contracts and all forms of employment.

The goal is to create a minimum level of universal protection. The new nature of the directive – the extended duty of information, new rights and reinforcement of employee protection means, increases the rigidity of the regulation and brings additional administrative burdens for businesses. Differences in national regulations, labour law practices and collective bargaining traditions in the individual EU Member States in the face of the newly proposed rules and a graded universal definition for all will bring a lot of legal uncertainty for businesses and cool their interest in creating jobs.

In principle, it is no longer about revising, but fundamentally transforming a simple and practicable directive that the employers do not question in a comprehensive package of universal worker rights. The new proposal is not justified in the day-to-day practices of companies, in the REFIT conclusions or in the regular Eurofound surveys, which show that over 80% of EU respondents are satisfied with their current working conditions.

Vladimíra Drbalová
EESC Member, Group I – Employers