KPMG: Employers ask for legislative flexibility on labour relations

Employers back the adoption of legislative framework amendments in view of making the labour relations more flexible and increasing the local labour market competitiveness, KPMG Romania Consultancy Department Director Mihaela Buzila told Agerpres on Friday.

'The quasi general opinion of the business environment, as we perceive it in our consultancy activities, is that certain legislative provisions are too restrictive and they are not in agreement with the labour market dynamics and the necessity of preserving the local labour market competitiveness,' said Mihaela Buzila.

The issue is related, for instance, to making the employment and labour agreements termination requirements more flexible or to the possibility of extending the fixed-term employment agreements, as the legislation in force allows for their extension for two consecutive times only and not more than 24 months in total.

Other legislative changes deemed useful for keeping Romania's high level of investment attractiveness aim at clarifying certain judicial issues regarding the collective labour agreements, such as the representation criteria of employers' associations and trade unions, as well as affiliation criteria of some employees to more than one trade union, in order to get legitimacy during negotiations.

Collective agreements clarifications are expected at the branch level as well. Thus, if a company has more than one activity branch and there are more collective agreements at branch level, which are potentially applicable, then legislative clarifications must be made in order to establish the way in which their provisions should be correlated.

'The necessity of these amendments comes from practice, they are requested by the market. In fact, many of the proposals related to the labour agreements flexibility are already applied, but with the help of various 'stratagems'. Still, legislation's adjustment is necessary, so that the flexibility should be legislatively recognised, and employers should gain confidence that the new employment actions would not turn against them, under the form of red tape and excessive financial implications,' said Mihaela Buzila.