Employers aren’t alone in feeling the effects of the coming into force on 25 May 2018 of the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) (Regulation (EU) 2016/679) and the ‘Federal law on data protection’ (Bundesdatenschutzgesetz – BDSG) (c.f. part 1 of the Planet Labor GDPR series article No 10595). From the 25 May all collective and company agreements that address employee personal data, which have already been adopted or are still to be adopted, will also have to comply with both texts. Ralf-Peter Hayen, the DGB’s Legal division Head explained to Planet Labor what company works councils had to pay attention to in order to comply with the new requirements and why Germany still needed a law on data treatment specifically for the world of work.
Data treatment via collective agreement. Germany’s companies are working overtime to comply with the GDPR (personal data protection) regulations by the 25 May 2018 deadline, because if they are not fully compliant, they risk draconian sanctions. “According to our estimates only one in eight companies will have fully complied with the GDPR requirements by the 25 May deadline,” warned the NTIC Bitkom federation on 24 November 2017. However employers are not the only actors to be affected by the new legislation. Company works councils (WCs) also have to check that their company agreements comply with the requirements stemming from the European regulation and the German data protection legislation.
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