02. 07. 2018.

At the 8th extraordinary session held on Thursday, June 28, the National Assembly of the Republic of Serbia adopted the Bill on Amendments to the Law on Peaceful Labor Dispute Resolution.

The Amendments to the Law significantly expanded the scope of the Republic Agency for Peaceful Settlement of Labor Disputes in accordance with its acquired experiences and practices.

The competence for individual labor disputes was also expanded to include the disputes arising from: payment of salaries/wages, allowance of salaries/wages in accordance with the law, payment of severance pays during retirement, working hours and exercising rights to annual leave.

According to the Amendments to the Law, a collective labor dispute,inter alia, is a dispute arising from: exercising rights to the establishment of union representativeness at the employer, as well as a dispute arising from minimum work process in accordance with the law. The complemented provisions of the Law stipulate that the parties to a dispute related to a public interest activity shall tend to peacefully solve the collective dispute in these cases.

The dispute resolution agreement may be concluded based on a recommendation or regardless of it. It was specified that, in case the dispute parties concluded the agreement, such agreement should become a basis for the conclusion of amendments to the collective agreement, or it should have an effect of an executive deed.

By means of the Amendments to the Law the previous 3-day deadline is extended to 5 days to allow the other party to declare wether they wish to participate in the proceedings.

The expert witness testimony is a significant novelty of the Law, so the dispute parties would be able to hire an expert witness if they wish to. Unlike the services of the arbitrator and conciliator, which are free of charge for the dispute parties, the expert witness hiring costs shall be borne by each dispute party.

The Amendments to the Law introduced a code of ethics for conciliators and arbitrators in the proceedings of peaceful labor dispute resolution. The code of ethics shall be enacted by the minister in charge of the labor affairs.