Cziria, Ludovít

From 10 April 2002, a new Labour Protection Information Centre (Informacné centrum ochrany práce, ICOP) has started to provide the Slovak public with the most up-to-date information in the areas of occupational safety and health and employment relations. Every employee and employer can obtain information from ICOP by personal visit, telephone, e-mail or fax. The main aim in establishing ICOP is to address the public's insufficient knowledge about the impact of various harmful factors at work. ICOP's role is to draw up scientific, professional and public documents and information, and to support their dissemination. In processing the information, the Centre’s staff is to contribute to an improved information flow in the area of occupational safety and health, applying international standards.

A new Labour Code came into effect in the Slovak Republic on 1 April 2002 (SK0206101N [1]). The Code had been approved by the National Council of the Slovak Republic on 2 July 2001 and was published in the Collection of Laws as No. 311/ 2001. [1] www.eurofound.europa.eu/ef/observatories/eurwork/articles/new-labour-legislation-implemented

As of 1 April 2002, a new Labour Code for the private sector and new labour legislation for the public sector came into force in the Slovak Republic. The previous Labour Code (adopted in 1965), amended more than 30 times, played a very important role in providing a comprehensive codification of employment and working conditions in Czechoslovakia, and as from 1 January 1993 (the date that the independent Slovak Republic was established) in Slovakia, too. It applied to all employees and employers equally, regardless of whether they were active in companies conducting a business or in public organisations.