In November 2016 Slovenia’s government presented its ‘Mini Labor Reform’ that comprised three elements, namely, combatting hidden employment in a country that uses various contract types other than the employment contract when engaging workers (e.g. civil law contracts, copyright contracts, independent workers contracts) by bolstering the power of labor inspectors, accelerating the process whereby the unemployed take up employment again, and making employment contract termination more flexible. The pieces of legislation then underwent intensive discussions by the social partners within the Social and Economic. At the start of June 2017 the government adopted two draft reforms on combatting hidden employment and accelerating the job finding process for the unemployed, leaving the reform to the employment relationship act to undergo further discussion. Trade unions are fiercely opposed to proposals that add flexibility into terminating employment relationships and are relying on support from the Labor Minister who is also opposed to the direction that such a measure would take. By Bostjan Kavsek, LL.M, Attorney-at Law in Ljubljana, Slovenia.
Avenues for reforming the employment relationship act. The government was looking at introducing harsher penalties (fines ranging from €5,000 to €30,000) for cases of excessive employer use of civil law contracts as well as creating a new penalty (ranging from €500 to €2,500) to be levied on employees who participate in this type of hidden employment fraud.
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