Kroupa, Aleš

Efforts to boost the Czech workforce by increasing the number of foreign workers in the country, a strike alert from education trade unions, and the funding level for social partner projects in 2020 are the main topics of interest in this article. This country update reports on the latest developments in working life in Czechia in the third quarter of 2019.

According to the 2015 Information on Working Conditions survey, there has been a significant increase in the number of collective agreements in the Czech Republic containing commitments on overall wage increases and commitments to increase salary tariff. However, the number of agreements dealing with bonuses and benefits remained practically the same.

ING Life Insurance, in conjunction with the Confederation of Industry of the Czech Republic, have carried out an annual survey of employee benefits since 2010. Employee benefits are provided by virtually all companies which, on average, offer 10 different benefits. Mobile phones and company-produced training were the most frequently offered benefits in 2014.

The Czech Labour Code, Act No 262/2006 Coll, came into force on 1 January 2007. Unlike the previous Labour Code, Act No 65/1965 Coll that had been in force since 1965, limits were placed on the amount of overtime hours that could be worked. The code also outlawed so-called standby work, where staff were expected to remain on-call at the workplace. Standby time, under the code, would now not be included in the framework of a regular working time.

This report provides a comparative overview of teamwork, based on the European Working Conditions Surveys and 16 national contributions to a questionnaire. It considers how teamwork has developed as a new form of work organisation and takes into account the context at national and company level. The study assesses the positive and negative influence of teamwork on diverse aspects of working conditions, such as job autonomy, job satisfaction, work intensity, productivity and the learning environment. It also investigates the prevalence of teamwork according to various factors including sex, sector and occupation. The national contributions from the following 16 countries are available: Austria, Bulgaria, the Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Hungary, Italy, the Netherlands, Portugal, Romania, Spain, Sweden and the United Kingdom.

Disclaimer: This information is made available as a service to the public but has not been edited or approved by the European Foundation for the Improvement of Living and Working Conditions. The content is the responsibility of the authors.

This paper analyses the capacity of the Czech Republic’s social partners to effectively engage in social dialogue at various levels. The paper forms part of a wider, comparative project, managed by the European Foundation for the Improvement of Living and Working Conditions (Ireland) and the Work Life Development Programme (Sweden). It is aimed at helping social partners in the 10 new EU Member States and the three acceding and candidate countries (Bulgaria, Romania, and Turkey) to build their capacity for social dialogue with a view to anticipating and managing change. The report concentrates on studying the organisational, financial, and personnel capacities of the national, central organisations of employers and trade unions for anticipating and managing change, anticipating future developments and implementing outputs.

Collective law in the Czech Republic only recognises two kinds of collective agreement: enterprise-level collective agreements (ELCAs), concluded between the appropriate trade union body and an employer; and higher-level collective agreements (HLCAs), concluded for a majority of employers between the appropriate higher-level trade union body and one or more employer organisations [1]. [1] www.eurofound.europa.eu/ef/observatories/eurwork/industrial-relations-dictionary/employer-organisations

Based on results of the survey ‘Measuring the quality of working life’, this report describes the nature and organisation of work for Czech employees. It also analyses work performance, motivation, job satisfaction and internal communication.

In 2003, in the Czech Republic, 1,486 occupational illnesses and 72 risks of illness were reported among 1,506 workers. The number of persons concerned is lower (1,506) than the total number of reported incidents because, for 50 workers, two or more illnesses or risks of illness were reported during the course of the year.