Labor legislation earns employers' ire

The Confederation of Polish Employers (KPP) and the Polish Confederation of Private Employers (PKPP) Lewiatan have criticized the new presidential drafts of the Polish Labor Inspectorate (PIP) Act and the Responsibility for Activities Against the Rights of Employees Act. The groups intend to refer the drafts to the Constitutional Tribunal.

"We are experiencing restrictions on entrepreneurial freedom in Poland," says Henryka Bochniarz, president of PKPP Lewiatan. Andrzej Malinowski, president of KPP, believes that the labor law should be simplified and entrepreneurial freedom should be increased. "Replacing these with repressions, imprecise regulations or treating each mistake as a crime causes huge losses," he says.

Employers have criticized a number of facets of the new law, including: the different responsibilities of state-owned companies and private enterprises; the extremely high penalties of between zł.1,000 and zł.100,000 or even three-year imprisonment for private employers who breach their employees' rights; punishing employers for mistakes made by their employees; penalties depending on the arbitration of the court; and a lack of a presumption of innocence. Experts from both confederations say the latter act is almost a copy of one rejected by the Constitutional Tribunal in 2002.

Malinowski says that the authors of the draft have forgotten about the influence of the new law on the labor market and says it will frighten potential foreign investors away from Poland. "The risk of entrepreneurial activities will rise and Poland will become an even less attractive labor market," he says.