EU ANTITRUST: HOT TOPICS & NEXT STEPS

EU ANTITRUST: HOT TOPICS & NEXT STEPS 2022

Prague, Czechia

2. Principles of labour law protecting the employee There is a dispute in the doctrine whether labour law belongs to the family of private or public rights. In this respect, one should agree with A. Musiała’s view that labour law is res publica (Musiała, 2020), as it is regulated by the state. The state creates employment policy, ensures decent working conditions, and protects the rights of employees. Therefore, it is the state that is obliged to ensure and exercise the law and policy. The principles of labour law, like the principles of other branches of law, are not, in principle, the basis for a substantive decision in employment matters, but nevertheless constitute an interpretative guideline that is so important when interpreting individual provisions of labour law. The rules define the general policy, the direction to be taken not only in jurisprudence, but also in the overall creation and application of law. According to the integral concept of R. Dworkin’s law, there are principles and policies of a specific branch of law. In this perspective, it is worth considering the principle indicated in the first place of labour law, namely the right to work. Although the times of the People’s Republic in Poland are long gone, and with them the obligation to work, the right to work is still the principle in force in labour law. It is also included among the constitutionally guaranteed economic, social and cultural freedoms and rights. As is clear from the provisions of Art. 65 sec. 5 of the Constitution of the Republic of Poland, public authorities pursue a policy aimed at full, productive employment by implementing programs to combat unemployment, including organizing and supporting vocational counselling and training, as well as public works and intervention works. This regulation was also repeated in Art. 10 § 3 of the Labour Code, where the legislature indicated that the state pursues a policy aimed at full productive employment (Szok, Terlecki, 2021, pp. 16–17). The law defined in this way is not, in principle, a law that protects the employee, but the labour market, which puts the goal of full or the greatest possible employment in the first place, and not providing every willing individual the right to take up a job that corresponds to their interests, opportunities, perceptions, etc. Similar provision, i.e., the right to work is also included in Art. 26 of the Czech Charter Of Fundamental Rights And Freedoms. Article 24 of the Polish Constitution states that every work is protected, which means that all work, regardless of the legal basis for its performance, must be protected by the state, and the obligation to ensure safe and hygienic working conditions applies to every citizen who performs work. The human right to decent working conditions and the human right to remuneration or even decent remuneration are two different subjective rights that are directly coherently related to each other.

402