(Washington Insider Magazine) -Portugal’s centre-left government has introduced one of Europe’s most employee-friendly laws both as a response to the challenges brought on by the home working uptick caused by the pandemic and as an attempt to attract more ‘digital nomads’ to the country.
It will be one of the last pieces of legislation introduced by the current minority socialist government with the anti-capitalist Left Bloc’s support. This is due to the imminent election that is being carried out two years ahead of schedule thanks to a political crisis in Lisbon.
The legislation is comprehensive and according to labour minister Ana Mendes Godinho addresses some of the workforce problems exacerbated by the pandemic which “accelerated the need to regulate what already needed to be regulated”.
A key tenet of it is the obliging of employers to “abstain from contacting” employees outside of the work hours except in emergencies. Failing to follow this will be deemed a serious breach of labour law.
The monitoring of homeworkers will also be prohibited to protect the privacy of those employees, and a mutual agreement has now become a compulsory feature of such home working arrangements. This includes all cases of remote working, with workers now given the legal option to refuse such an arrangement without any obligation to provide reasons. Alternatively, companies must justify any declined requests by employees to work from home if they request to do so.
It also covers parental rights, with carers and parents looking after children to the age of eight now having the right to work remotely without requesting consent from an employer, if the nature of the job allows.
The law, which covers many more bases, is unlikely to be embraced by the business community. Fears of drops in productivity and too much worker power are repeated themes in the wealthy’s vocal criticisms of the centre-left government. However, the strictest of the laws will only affect larger companies, with corporations employing fewer than ten people not being subject to the full weight of the legislation.
The rules are meant to complement the tax breaks that are already in place to attract tech entrepreneurs and other digital workers who can potentially migrate more easily than most.
