What is the factory resistance?

Conflicts in the workplace are more or less the order of the day. A conflict between employees or disagreements between an employee and an employer is not something that could significantly interfere with running a business. However, the problem arises when there is a collective conflict between employees and the employer. If the matter is not settled quickly, the so-called company dispute may eventually even lead to the immobilization of the company for a long time.

A company dispute, or a collective dispute, may concern a number of different issues: the reality and standard of work, pay conditions, social benefits or manifestations of mobbing or discrimination of a specific group of employees. In such situations, it is important not to sweep the problems under the carpet, but to face them and, as part of an amicable agreement, find a compromise between the interests of employees and the entrepreneur.

The subject matter of company labour disputes is regulated by the Act on the Resolution of Collective Disputes (hereinafter referred to as the Act on Collective Disputes). In the provision of Article 1 of the Act on Collective Disputes there is a definition of a dispute, according to which „a collective dispute between employees and an employer or employers may concern working conditions, wages or social benefits as well as the trade union rights and freedoms of employees or other groups who have the right to associate in trade unions”. This means that the resulting company dispute should concern not only the interests of employees, but also their rights. Therefore, the dispute is not aimed solely at raising the individual standard of work of a given group of employees, but is intended to establish new company regulations that will take into account the interests of the whole or a specific group of employees.

As follows from the above definition, one of the parties to the dispute must be the employer – he can act independently or authorize the employers’ organization to represent.

The other side is the employees who constitute an organized community. A collective dispute cannot therefore be initiated by a single employee on its own. However, the legal literature takes the view that this cannot apply to small establishments where fewer than three employees are employed. In such cases, one or two employees already constitute a „collective” of the workplace and have the right to initiate company disputes. Moreover, other employees may also be parties, such as members of agricultural production cooperatives, persons providing work under an agency contract, persons performing home work, pensioners and the unemployed who have retained the right to belong to trade union organisations or joined a trade union.

However, it is necessary to distinguish between the possibility of initiating a dispute and its conduct. In the latter case, according to Article 3 of the Act on Collective Disputes of Employees, the trade union must always represent. At the same time, in a workplace where more than one trade union organization operates, each of them can represent the interests of employees. In addition, if an agreement is reached between these organisations, they may form a joint trade union representation. On the other hand, if there is no trade union in the enterprise, the collective dispute may be conducted by the trade union organization to which the employees have asked to represent their collective interests.

Due to the nature of the work performed, officers of the Police, Border Guard, Prison Service, State Fire Service and employees of the Supreme Chamber of Control were excluded from the group of entities that could be a party to the dispute.

According to the definition contained in Article 1 of the Act on Collective Disputes, the subject of the dispute may be working conditions, wages and social benefits (i.e. the interests of employees). In addition, employees can fight for their rights and freedoms of association, i.e. the right to better treatment, non-discrimination or improvement of psychological comfort of work. Disputes concerning employee interests usually affect such matters as inadequately low levels of wages, unpaid overtime, non-compliance with health and safety rules, problems with the free use of legally entitled annual or parental leave. The reason may also be the limitation or withdrawal of existing social privileges, such as subsidies for annual leave of employees and camps for employees’ children, or programs allowing the use of cultural goods (cinema, theater, museums).

In addition, it should be noted that not always a low salary can be a reason for a collective dispute regarding wages. Such a dispute may also concern the conditions for granting other financial benefits related to work, m.in quarterly bonuses or the so-called thirteen, as well as the conditions for the acquisition and calculation of retirement and disability pension severance pay.

Source: https://poradnikprzedsiebiorcy.pl/-spor-zakladowy-jak-prawidlowo-przeprowadzic-zbiorowy-spor-z-pracownikami

Region Gdański NSZZ „Solidarność”

Projekt otrzymał dofinansowanie z Norwegii poprzez Fundusze Norweskie 2014-2021, w ramach programu „Dialog społeczny – godna praca”.

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