AEQUITAS lawyers participated in EUROBAK HR Committee's working meeting
On 30 June 2015, AEQUITAS lawyers participated in EUROBAK HR Committee's working meeting dedicated to the discussion of the new draft Labor Code of the Republic of Kazakhstan, topical issues of the local labor legislation and possible ways to solve them.
Representatives of companies active in different sectors of economy, law firms and recruitment agencies took part in the discussion. According to the discussion results, a conclusion was made that the current Labor Code neither meets business interests, nor allows for flexible personnel management. In practice, there often occur situations, which cannot be settled due to gaps in legislation or conflict of laws, or their settlement is time-consuming and requires significant material expenditures. Certain instruments, which would allow efficiently using labor resources, are not available.
Based on their sound work experience and systemic outlook on local legislation, AEQUITAS lawyers have prepared more than 60 well-grounded suggestions on how to change the current regulation of labor relations, which will soon be submitted for consideration to the working group preparing the new draft Labor Code of the Republic of Kazakhstan. The key changes suggested by AEQUITAS labor practice team are as follows:
· To simplify the procedure for employment agreement termination on employer's initiative. According to AEQUITAS lawyers, the current legislation allows bad-faith employees to abuse the stipulated rights and guarantees, thus deadlocking the employer. It is necessary to reconsider and expand the list of grounds for employment agreement termination on employer's initiative, simplify the procedure for imposing disciplinary sanctions and exclude the necessity to execute certain documents.
· To introduce a detailed regulation of the employee representatives institute, given that many companies have structural subdivisions and, accordingly, personnel based at different localities; and given the personnel turnover.
· To extend the specifics of regulation over labor relations with the legal entity's executive body to also cover the heads of branches and representative offices, clarifying or changing the respective provisions of the current Labor Code.
· To elaborate on certain labor remuneration issues. It is suggested to introduce a possibility to accrue and pay salary in foreign currency (at least to foreign employees); remove limitations on hourly rate remuneration; make the procedure for calculation and payment of different compensations more specific (in cases of recall from paid leave, employee dismissal, etc.).
· To introduce the employee secondment institute widely used in western practice.