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CONCLUDING REMARKS AND RECOMMENDATIONS

When it comes to the recommendations in conditions of further maturation of the economic, social and health crisis under the influence of the pandemic, to be clearer, several paradoxical cases must be highlighted during the introduction of mandatory quarantine for all citizens of the Republic of North Macedonia. 

First, a large proportion of employers in the textile, leather, and shoe industries were allowed to organize their work process as they saw fit, allowing workers to continue to perform their duties smoothly during the quarantine introduced by the state. So the question is: were the quarantine and the curfew enforced or are the work permits of certain employers legal during the quarantine? The above-mentioned decrees that touch on labor law issues have once again shown the chaotic legislation in the field of labor as vague, contradictory and contrary to the conventions of the International Labor Organization (ILO).The overproduction in the field of labor, the poor systematization of the laws, the vague and low-quality legal solutions supplemented by the vague and hasty regulations with legal force during the pandemic, made chaos in the private sector in RnM. The most important thing is the interpretation and application of these decrees with legal force through the prism of the judicial service in RNM which has yet to give the result for already initiated labor disputes related to the above commented decrees.

The association "Glasen Tekstilec" maintains a database of free legal aid provided during the pandemic and the introduced decrees, measures and recommendations. What is noticeable from the database is that there is an increased number of cancellations during the pandemic and the state of emergency introduced in RNM. The dismissals that were given are for various reasons and they are mostly due to breaches of order and discipline, contractual dismissals and expiration of fixed-term employment contracts. What is important to emphasize is that there are no redundancies for business reasons (organizational, technological, structural or economic reasons) that are only relevant to the specific situation and which redundancies are directly related to reasons in the work of the employer. These dismissals are avoided by employers because they should be used to pay employees severance pay depending on the years spent in employment by the unemployed. Hence, we again come to a dilemma: why is there such a provision in the Labor Law, if it is almost not respected at all?

Many workers faced pressure during the state of emergency to sign redundancies, annex fixed-term contracts, or sign an annex to a full-time, part-time contract. The workers and their poor socio-economic situation related to the lethargy of the entire economic and legal system in RNM with the consistent labor market with the partisan society, forced them to sign due to lack of choice and some of the above legal matters because directly the livelihood of their families was endangered. From the applications in the association it can be determined that some of the workers faced a change in the contracts from indefinite to part-time, from full-time to part-time, without the workers signing the newly changed employment contracts or annexes to already existing contracts. At the same time, the bad legislation for the transformation of the employment relationship enables the employer to give a fixed-term employment contract to its employees for up to 5 years. Poor legal solutions and the possibility for the employer to give fixed-term contracts to its employees for up to five years, although there is a constant need for permanent jobs, during Covid-19 resulted in non-renewal of part-time contracts.

As participants in the drafting of the new Labor Law, the most important change that "Glasen Tekstilec" would strive for is: concluding a contract of indefinite working hours with a duration of not more than one year at the latest, in order to prevent the current practice of exploiting and oppressing the labor of workers in the private sector. This would create employment security that is directly related to the existence of workers and their families, and the well-being of a society.

Some of the cases reported by the workers to "Glasen Tekstilec" referred to the fact that the employers threatened them with dismissal or use of unpaid days, even though they meet the conditions for using paid leave from work. This type of mobbing is difficult to prove, as workers find it difficult to decide to bring disputes before the competent courts. This is because it is directly related to the existence of their families.

The lack of LRO to properly regulate work from home, resulted in new challenges that were especially visible during the pandemic. For example, if some of the employees in the textile industry get work assignments that they could perform from home (and are covered specifically in this situation, with temporary measures), there were complaints from employees that the employer owed them too much work that did not it is possible to perform for eight hours of operation. At the end of the week after the delivery of the work done from home to the employers by the workers, the employers are dissatisfied with the work done, and the workers are underpaid and overworked from performing this type of work responsibilities. This institute of labor law "work from home" must undergo additional changes regulated in the Labor Law, especially in the part of the performance that is expected to be fulfilled by the employee when performing work tasks from home. 

In our opinion, it is necessary to define in the Labor Law of the institute "work from home", the performance and further regulation in the collective agreements at the branch level.

It is also important to provide for a unified approach by inspection services regarding work protocols, especially in the area of occupational safety and health and organized transport of employees. Furthermore, the Public Revenue Office is obliged in accordance with the existing Article 260 of the Labor Law to provide information to the State Labor Inspectorate for payments below the minimum wage for regular work of employees, and especially strict when it comes to misuse of state finances that are purposeful, in this case, for payment of the minimum wage.

Joint database at local level between the Employment Agency, the Public Revenue Office and the State Labor Inspectorate where information will be shared and responds in a timely manner in cases of abuse with annexes where working hours are reduced without the knowledge of an employee, annexes to contracts from indefinite to specified time and settlement cancellations.

In particular, efforts should be made to strengthen the control over the payment of targeted state aid to the private sector and to avoid the payment of direct assistance for the payment of wages to the account of employers, i.e. to pay it directly to the account of the employees to whom it refers.

In general, all the decrees adopted during this period of crisis and state of emergency are vague and contradictory and probably hasty, without analysis of the consequences. It is a fact that is evident in the fact that the same decrees with legal force have been amended and changed several times by the Government during the state of emergency. The time that has passed and the adopted decrees that are valid from today's perspective, should be used in the future, in order to learn a lesson in order to make legal solutions that will be simple and easily applicable without the possibility of different interpretation as is the practice so far, but only to be interpreted through the prism of the state and the well-being of the same state and its citizens.