The Constitutional Court Cancelled Part of the Labour Code

The Constitutional Court cancelled 11 provisions, including a major part of Section 2, subsection 1, restricting the principle of contractual freedom between the parties to labour relationships. Section 4 introduces another change; it used to admit the application of Civil Code to labour relationships under explicitly defined circumstances only; however, the Constitutional Court emphasized that the Civil Code constitutes a general private and civil piece of legislation that may be applied to support issues in other private-law areas, i.e. if a particular law applicable to a particular area of private law, the general civil-law provisions shall apply. On the other hand, the Constitutional Court refused that Sections 48 and 49 of the Civil Code (rescission) be used as support since they may be misused – a party might have rescinded an employment agreement instead of having terminated it on due termination grounds. The award had a substantial impact on the former provisions applicable to trade unions and their activities toward employee councils. The Constitutional Court admitted that trade unions, an employee council and a work safety representative may all function concurrently in a single employer. The broad inspection and executive powers included in the provisions of Section 321, subsections 2 through 4 and Section 322, subsections 2 and 3 were cancelled such as the right to prohibit overtime and night work which would jeopardize the safety and health of employees. The possibility was renewed for employers in which trade unions operate to issue internal rules. These changes took effect on the date on which the award was published in the Collection of Acts, i.e. on 14 April 2008.