Normative legal acts in the sphere of labour law and labour regulation.

In the field of labour law, there are two types of normative and legal acts – Regulations and Directives.

Regulations: Article 249 names three features of this type of documents, which distinguish them from other acts of the secondary law and attach to them the highest place in the hierarchy of the Union’s secondary legislation: a normative act of general application; a binding act; an act of direct application.

Norms of the Regulation are binding for all Member States, their Bodies, legal and private persons.

Regulations are applied along with the national legislation of the Member States. These acts harmonize national legislations and have the same legal effect as laws. Directive is a normative act; it is binding for all Member States; it does not require direct application in the Member States, “shall leave to the national authorities the choice of form and methods”. Directive is a means of harmonization of the Member States’ legislation. A directive should be complemented by a corresponding act of the national legislation that would implement its provisions. The Directive itself has a time limit within which it should be implemented.

 

9.The origins of labour law.

History of labour law concerns the development of labour law as a way of regulating and improving the life of people at work. In the great civilisations of antiquity there were great aggregations of labour which was not solely, though frequently it was predominantly, slave labour. The first landmark of modern labour law was the British Health and Morals of Apprentices Act of 1802, sponsored by the elder Sir Robert Peel. Similar legislation for the protection of the young was adopted in Zürich in 1815 and in France in 1841. By 1848 the first legal limitation of the working hours of adults was adopted by the Landsgemeinde of the Swiss canton of Glarus. Sickness insurance and workmen’s compensation were pioneered by Germany in 1883 and 1884, and compulsory arbitration in industrial disputes was introduced in New Zealand in the 1890s.

10.The first labor code regulation.

Labour codes or other forms of comprehensive labour legislation and ministries of labour were not introduced until the 20th century. The first labour code (which, like many of its successors, was a consolidation rather than a codification) was projected in France in 1901 and promulgated in stages from 1910 to 1927. Among the more advanced formulations affecting the general condition of labour were the Mexican Constitution of 1917 and the Weimar Constitution of Germany of 1919, both of which gave constitutional status to certain general principles of social policy regarding economic rights. Provisions of this kind have become increasingly common and are now widespread in all parts of the world. Departments or ministries of labour responsible for the effective administration of labour legislation and for promoting its future development were established in Canada in 1900, in France in 1906, in the United States in 1913, in the United Kingdom in 1916, and in Germany in 1918. They became general in Europe and were established in India and Japan during the following years and became common in Latin America in the ’30s.

 

11.Hierarchy of the sources of labor law.

The hierarchy of the sources of law as specified by the 1968 Act is as follows: 1.mandatory legal provisions; 2.collective agreements which have been decreed generally applicable, in the following order of precedence (agreements concluded within the National Labour Council, a Joint Committee, a Joint Subcommittee); collective agreements which have not been decreed generally applicable, where the employer is a signatory thereto or is a member of an association that is a signatory thereto, in the following order of precedence (agreements concluded within the National Labour Council, a Joint Committee, agreements concluded within a Joint Subcommittee, agreements concluded outside any joint body); written individual contracts of employment; collective agreements concluded within a joint body but not decreed generally applicable and operates in an industry covered by the joint body within which the agreement was concluded; work rules; supplementary legal provisions; oral individual contracts of employment; custom". The Supreme Court of Justice holds that in accordance with Article 51 it is possible for a written individual contract of employment to be replaced or changed by a later oral contract.

12.The nature and purpose of both voluntary and legal labour regulation.

 Broadly speaking, the employment relationship is regulated by both voluntary and legal measures. Voluntary measures comprise agreements and other decisions that derive from collective bargaining, arbitration, conciliation, mediation, and grievance and discipline handling. They also include voluntarily accepted standards of good employment practice. Legal measures are European Union treaties and directives, the European Convention on Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms 1950, British statute law, the common law of contract and of tort, case law, statutory codes of practice and some international standards. In practice, these are not isolated sets of measures. As we shall see, voluntary and legal measures invariably interlink and influence each other.

13.The purposes of voluntary and legal labour measures.

There are two broad purposes. First, at various points, they influence the function of management –the ways in which managers exercise power, control and organize workforces and manage conflicts of interest. This influence can be illustrated in the following way. It is widely accepted that the employment relationship is characterized

by an imbalance of power in favor of the employer. Both voluntary and legal regulation can restrain the unfettered exercise of this employer power. So, for example, collective bargaining with a trade union can minimize the exploitation of individuals at work by agreements on pay and conditions, and also by helping to process grievances. The second purpose of this regulation is to assert certain principles. On the one hand, there are those principles that influence the nature and quality of decisions (e.g. fairness, equal treatment, reasonableness, etc.). In addition, there are those principles which mould the regulatory process itself.

14.Globalization and the changing role of labor law .

One major labour law study notes that the ‘study of comparative employment law has increased in importance in recent years largely because of the growing tendency towards international economic integration and the development of transnational labour standards. Globalization has made a significant impact on the nature and profile of labour rights arguably diminishing the efficacy of national level employment law and labour market regulation with issues of labour abuses and the degradation of workers’ rights being a common theme. The role of international labour regulation has acquired renewed attention and pertinence. Issues of child labour, slave labour, forced labour and a variety of other forms of economic exploitation have been prominent in debates. To these debates have also been added the issue of ‘social dumping’ and the responsibilities of transnational companies in implementing and maintaining labour standards. The regulation of these transnational corporations poses many difficulties. Attempts have been made to introduce privatized forms of regulation such as codes of conduct and social labeling systems.                                                                                                                                                          

15) The substantive law on wages and remuneration.

Remuneration is the total of the financial and nonfinancial benefits to the employee of all the elements in the employment package. The substantive law on wages and remuneration covers such elements as forms and methods of payment, the protection of wages against unlawful deductions and other abuses, minimum wage arrangements, and other topics.

Remuneration has historically included payroll as well as other forms of employee compensation. Most states, however, rely on the National Council on Compensation Insurance (NCCI) to determine remuneration. NCCI's definition of remuneration includes forms of employee compensation, such as:

• Salary or hourly pay
• Commissions

Bonuses

• Overtime pay, less the premium portion
• Holiday, vacation and sick pay
• Rental value of employer-provided housing
• Value of employer-provided meals and lodging
• Time worked and accrued vacation upon dismissal
• Piecework, incentive plans, and profit-sharing plans
• Value of store certificates, merchandise or credits given to employees

16) The employment opportunities for women.

Many women enjoy successful careers and manage to combine rewarding employment whilst maintaining a family and a social life. At the same time the entrenched inequalities of the past continue to cast a shadow.

However, the situation is improving. The enforcement of sex equality began 40 years ago with the Equal Pay Act. In subsequent decades, the gap between men and women’s pay has narrowed substantially. In 2010, according to the National Statistics website, the full-time gender pay gap stood at around 10.2%, down from 12.2% in 2009. However, at higher levels of industry and business, change has been slow. According to corporate governance group, Manifest, of the top 250 FTSE companies, there are only 24 female executive directors. Former trade minister Lord Davies is leading an enquiry that will ensure that by 2015, women will make up 25% of directors in the UK’s largest public companies.

Despite the fact that girls do as well, or better than boys whilst in education, there still seems to be a gap in pay levels. A number of factors play a part in this:

• Women tend to gravitate to the public sector, where graduate salaries can be on the low side. Men head in greater numbers into technology and business in the private sector where pay is better.

• Across most fields, when promotions are being considered, masculine qualities of confidence and forcefulness may be given greater weight than women’s typical strengths in people skills.
• As careers progress, an often decisive factor is played by the demands of childcare and the family which may remove women from the workplace for crucial years, or at least divide their attention.
• Downright discrimination also plays a part, despite being unlawful - for example, Sir Alan Sugar said he would think twice before employing women who might become pregnant.
• Women are sometimes judged on appearance in a way that men are not.

Men can suffer from discrimination as well as women, finding it difficult to make headway in traditionally female-dominated professions - notably nursing and primary teaching.

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