Controversy over new workplace health and safety legislation

In January 2007, a new Labour Code governing basic regulations for health and safety at work, among other things, came into effect. In addition, Act No. 309/2006 Coll. on occupational health and safety has also come into effect. The act contains key provisions regarding the professional competency of those working in the area of occupational health and safety. However, the new legislation has caused divisions among employers and the trade unions in this area. As a result, the Chamber of Commerce has filed a complaint with the Constitutional Court of the Czech Republic claiming that some of the provisions of the new health and safety legislation are unconstitutional.

On 1 January 2007, Act No. 309/2006 Coll. on health and safety at work in industrial relations and on securing health and safety in activities or in providing services outside industrial relations came into effect. The new act, which adapts standards concerning occupational health and safety to the new Labour Code, transposes into law the relevant EU regulations and covers other requirements for health and safety at work.

Professional competency provisions

Section 9 of the act obliges employers to implement measures aimed at evaluating and preventing risks that could potentially endanger their employees’ lives or health. It stipulates that tasks concerning risk prevention and the coordination of health and safety at work on construction sites be performed solely by persons who are professionally competent for such work.

In addition to having the appropriate expertise, an individual implementing occupational health and safety measures must also have good communication skills, as they are required to work in close cooperation with other stakeholders, such as the employer, senior management, employees, employee health and safety representatives, and trade union representatives. The employer is obliged to furnish the professionally qualified person with the resources and time required for their risk-prevention activities, particularly concerning employees on fixed-term employment contracts, employees under 18 years of age, pregnant employees, employees who are breastfeeding, female employees with children up to nine months of age, and temporary agency workers who are assigned to work for another employer. The employer is also obliged to provide documentation and information on all known facts and circumstances that could influence an employee’s safety at work, or which could harm their health.

According to the new legislation, only professionally competent employees may independently service, assemble, control or repair technical equipment that poses an increased level of risk to employees’ lives or health. In addition to sound health and the prescribed age, the preconditions for professional competency include: professional training as stipulated by the appropriate legal regulation, the stipulated duration of work experience, and the successful completion of a professional examination.

In accordance with Council Directive 92/57/EEC on the implementation of minimum safety and health requirements at temporary or mobile construction sites, the third part of the act stipulates other requirements for persons working as health and safety at work coordinators in building sites (the institution of coordinator was not previously covered by Czech law, despite the fact that it is an institution of prevention policy which is regularly used in EU directives). A coordinator is an individual or organisation appointed by the owner of a construction project to perform the activities stipulated during the planning of construction work, or during work at the construction site. This individual must satisfy the appropriate professional competency requirements for the function of coordinator. Moreover, the coordinator is obliged to maintain the confidentiality of all information and facts which they learn of during the course of their work, and which it would be inappropriate to divulge to other parties.

Objections of employers

The terms for ascertaining and verifying professional competency are covered by a government regulation that sets out the conditions for awarding accreditation to, or suspending or removing accreditation from an individual or organisation; the measures include provisions relating to the content of professional competency examinations, their organisational arrangements, and the relevant documentation. The draft government regulation, which was subject to discussions, has raised objections from the employer side, specifically the Czech Confederation of Commerce and Tourism (Svaz obchodu a cestovního ruchu CR, SO CR). The latter organisation regards the proposed five-year periodical testing of professional competence as being discriminatory against safety technicians whose work in companies often lacks the backing of their employers, and whose status may be further undermined among employers by this repeated testing.

At the same time, employers have raised objections over the rights of trade unions to supervise the status of health and safety at work. According to the employers, the new Labour Code has unjustifiably extended trade unions’ rights in this field. As a result, the Chamber of Commerce of the Czech Republic (Hospodárská komora CR, HK) has filed a complaint with the Constitutional Court of the Czech Republic (Ústavní soud Ceské republiky). The employers contend that the new provisions give trade unions the right to interfere in corporate management and are therefore unconstitutional. They are primarily concerned by the trade unions’ right to prohibit night work and overtime. In response, Milan Štech, President of the Czech-Moravian Confederation of Trade Unions (Ceskomoravská konfederace odborových svazu, CMKOS), the largest trade union body in the Czech Republic, commented that the step taken by the Chamber of Commerce represented an attempt to worsen employees’ welfare.

Jaroslav Hala, Research Institute for Labour and Social Affairs