📋 Tender Overview
The Ministry of Social Affairs sent a draft to the coordination group amending the conditions for extending collective agreements. The aim is that wage and working time conditions can be extended to the whole sector only if agreed by employers who offer work to at least one-fifth of the sectors workers.According to the draft trade unions and employers associations or unions whose members offer jobs to at least 20 per cent of employees in the field can further agree on the extension of wage and working time conditions. Before concluding an agreement there is an obligation to publicly inform and involve all employees and employers to whom the conditions are to be extended. The reason for amending the law is the judgment of the Supreme Court of 15 June which gave an interpretation that a collective agreement cannot be extended without the consent of all employers. The purpose of the draft is to alleviate the bottlenecks identified by the Supreme Court and again to enable the extension of collective agreements.Of course the protection of workers must be ensured in which collective agreements play an increasing role. At the same time it is important that an agreement to extend the agreement is reached with employers who employ a significant part of the sector. It is important that all employees and employers who may be affected by the change are publicly informed about the intention to extend the collective agreement and negotiations said Minister of Social Affairs Tanel Kiik.Under the current law employers and employees representative organizations can extend the terms of wages and working hours concluded between them to all other employers and employees who are not otherwise parties to the collective agreement. In practice however this poses problems as it is possible that a small number of workers and employers will agree on rules that will apply to everyone else. In the opinion of the Chancellor of Justice and the Supreme Court this is not in accordance with the principle of freedom of enterprise as companies have to meet conditions that they have not agreed upon themselves. In Estonia the extension of the collective agreement is in use in the medical and transport sectors. The Estonian Employers Confederation and the Estonian Trade Union Confederation also agree annually on a minimum wage which will be extended to all Estonian employees.The draft also increases the protection of employees representatives and increases the compensation for illegal termination in cases where the employment contract is terminated either with the right to pregnancy maternity or maternity leave or with an employees employee representative.The bill amends the Trade Unions Act and the Employees Trustee Act and obliges an employer whose company has several trustees to give free time to all trustees. In addition the Employment Contracts Act will be amended and the rate of compensation will be increased if it is established that the termination of an employment contract with a worker entitled to pregnancy maternity or maternity leave or an employees representative was illegal. The benefit is increased from six months to 12 months.
