Labour legislation
The standards governing both individual and collective labour legislation are set out in a large number of individual and special laws. However, in order to be successful in the quest for legal certainty, the employer or his adviser must not only be familiar with this almost incomprehensible forest of laws but also with the highly complex jurisprudence of courts of first instance and the German federal labour court as well as of the German constitutional court and the European Court of Justice.
The example of the law on protection against dismissal and practice regarding related complaints demonstrates that legal certainty is usually difficult to achieve or is secured through the payment of settlements. As a result, small and medium-sized enterprises are often wary of recruiting new workers even when they have healthy order books. Furthermore, labour legislation has a tendency to stifle individual initiative by imposing ever tighter requirements. For instance, despite the positive trend in part-time work, a bureaucratic statutory right to request part-time working arrangements has been put in place.
The labour market potential of modern forms of working such as fixed-term contracts and temporary agency work cannot be realised due to restrictive rules. In the area of collective labour legislation, unwieldy co-determination procedures and rigid rules on the participation of employee representatives in the supervisory board work to the detriment of Germany as a location for business. In addition, the autonomy of the social partners is at risk due to the practice of strikes by union branches and jurisprudence on the law governing labour disputes, which distorts the parity between the two sides to the disadvantage of employers.
For modern and flexible labour legislation
What is therefore needed is modern and flexible labour legislation which does justice to all parties. Existing labour rules, be they national or European, have to be scaled back to an appropriate level in order to give fresh impetus for employment creation. Labour legislation must once more fulfil its original function of providing a regulatory framework for the labour market. Reform of protection against dismissal through the addition of a settlement option, company-level alliances for jobs, ensuring pay uniformity and necessary changes to co-determination rules at plant and group level are just a few examples of the urgent need for reform in German labour legislation.
With this goal in view, BDA represents the interests of German businesses in all legislative procedures with implications for labour legislation, including at European level. With its own initiatives such as the proposal for a modern labour market order, BDA develops new approaches which take account of the needs of the economy against the background of globalisation without disregarding the interests of employees.
BDA stands for:
The example of the law on protection against dismissal and practice regarding related complaints demonstrates that legal certainty is usually difficult to achieve or is secured through the payment of settlements. As a result, small and medium-sized enterprises are often wary of recruiting new workers even when they have healthy order books. Furthermore, labour legislation has a tendency to stifle individual initiative by imposing ever tighter requirements. For instance, despite the positive trend in part-time work, a bureaucratic statutory right to request part-time working arrangements has been put in place.
The labour market potential of modern forms of working such as fixed-term contracts and temporary agency work cannot be realised due to restrictive rules. In the area of collective labour legislation, unwieldy co-determination procedures and rigid rules on the participation of employee representatives in the supervisory board work to the detriment of Germany as a location for business. In addition, the autonomy of the social partners is at risk due to the practice of strikes by union branches and jurisprudence on the law governing labour disputes, which distorts the parity between the two sides to the disadvantage of employers.
For modern and flexible labour legislation
What is therefore needed is modern and flexible labour legislation which does justice to all parties. Existing labour rules, be they national or European, have to be scaled back to an appropriate level in order to give fresh impetus for employment creation. Labour legislation must once more fulfil its original function of providing a regulatory framework for the labour market. Reform of protection against dismissal through the addition of a settlement option, company-level alliances for jobs, ensuring pay uniformity and necessary changes to co-determination rules at plant and group level are just a few examples of the urgent need for reform in German labour legislation.
With this goal in view, BDA represents the interests of German businesses in all legislative procedures with implications for labour legislation, including at European level. With its own initiatives such as the proposal for a modern labour market order, BDA develops new approaches which take account of the needs of the economy against the background of globalisation without disregarding the interests of employees.
BDA stands for:
- Modern labour legislation: removal of red tape, legal certainty, modernisation of protection against dismissal, wider possibilities for fixed-term contracts
- Innovative forms of working: promotion of part-time work on a voluntary basis, flexible working time models and working time accounts, tele-working
- Employment-friendly co-determination and collective bargaining law, more responsibility for the social partners, forward-looking rules on business-friendly employee involvement
- Company-level alliances for jobs: creation of a legally certain base which enables social partners to set aside collectively agreed rules in order to preserve jobs
- Labour legislation as an essential cornerstone of the economic order
- Restoration of the conciliation function and contractual freedom in labour legislation
