Luxembourg trade union LCGB has voiced its opinion on the Chamber of Deputies’ decision to reform reemployment aid.
The Chamber of Deputies yesterday voted on the Bill 7086 for a series of adaptations of the Labour Code including the full maintenance of wages, which the LCGB considers to strengthen the rights of employees. On the other hand, the LCGB has put forth its view that the reform of reemployment aid results in a simple measure of budgetary savings and therefore constitutes a deterioration of the rights of employees.
In view of the problems that have been known since the introduction of the single statute in 2009, the LCGB has welcomed the fact that the issue of full salary maintenance in case of sickness has finally been settled by a new piece of legislation, which corresponds to the conclusions drawn by the Court of Cassation in its judgment of July 2013. The LCGB deplores however that the file could not be settled more quickly in the interest of the employees concerned.
With regard to reemployment assistance, the LCGB has stated that this is an important social measure in favour of maintaining employment and safeguarding the lives of private sector employees, thus aiming to mitigate the consequences of accepting a new, lower-paying job and providing some income support for employees who have lost their jobs.
The LCGB recalled that the impact of the initial version of this reform was reduced thanks to the bipartite agreement of 28 November 2014 between the government and the trade unions, which provided for the duration of the reemployment aid to be maintained at 48 months and the amount at 90% of previous earnings capped at 3.5 times the non-qualified minimum social wage.
However, according to the LCGB, the new system of reemployment assistance only partly respects the bipartite agreement mentioned above and is characterised by a series of further deteriorations. For instance, reemployment assistance has now been limited to those who are over 45 years old and can no longer be allocated for a period exceeding the duration of the employment relationship prior to the loss of employment. Furthermore, for employees on permanent contracts, the period of work prior to the loss of employment must be at least 24 months.
The LCGB has always defended the position that a limitation of reemployment aid on the basis of the age of the beneficiary is unacceptable, that the period of payment of the reemployment aid must be 48 months for all beneficiaries and that a mechanism to prevent the hiring of qualified low-wage employees must be put in place to avoid an abusive application at the expense of the employee of the new rule of 50% of the income paid by the employer.
The LCGB has drawn the conclusion that the government has shown more interest in budgetary savings than better protection of employees in this matter.
