Flexibility amendment to Labour Code headed into comment procedure
A flexibility amendment (flexinovela in Czech) to the Labour Code recently presented by the Minister of Labour and Social Affairs has already been sent to official commenting points. Its main objective is to increase the flexibility of labour relations, make employers more competitive, and promote the work-life balance of employees. The amendment affects many areas of the Labour Code, including the origination and termination of employment.
One of the key changes is the possibility of concurrence of agreements to perform work / to carry out a job (outside employment) with parental leave. This means that under one of the agreements on work outside the employment concluded for the duration of parental leave, employees will be able to perform the same work with their employers as they did before taking parental leave. The amendment is also more supportive to employees returning to work after parental leave: while currently an employee is guaranteed the return to ‘the same chair’ only after returning from maternity leave, the same would also apply to employees returning from parental leave before their child turns two.
Other major changes concern the termination notice period: it should start to run from the date the notice is delivered to the other party. It will also be possible to shorten the period for punitive notices to one month.
Flexibility should also be promoted by increasing the maximum length of a trial period to up to four months for ordinary staff and eight months for senior staff, with the possibility of extension during the trial period. In this respect, however, the amendment may run up against the EU Directive on transparent and predictable working conditions, which requires the length of the trial period to be reasonable. Under the directive, trial periods should in principle (with exceptions) not exceed six months.
Changes introduced by the amendment should also clarify employees‘ rights in the event of invalid termination of employment and regulate the right to special compensation in the event of termination of employment due to an accident at work or occupational disease; this special compensation should be reimbursed to employers from statutory insurance.
The Labour Code should newly allow for self-scheduling of shifts by the employee at the workplace, which is currently only possible for employees working remotely. Employers will also be able to pay wages in a currency other than the Czech currency in more cases and during the summer holidays employ minors above 14 years of age who have not completed their compulsory schooling. The proposal also includes the possibility for employers to reduce the mandatory daily rest period of employees to six hours in emergency situations.
The above list of changes to the Labour Code is not exhaustive, and the further development of the amendment will depend on the outcome of the comment procedure. Individual areas may still undergo substantial changes in the course of the legislative process. A widely discussed but not yet agreed upon topic is the termination of employment without giving a reason. The final wording of the law is therefore still in question.