Protection of rights of employees in case of employment contract’s suspension under the martial law

Abstract

The author focuses on the actual problems of implementing the employee's right to protection in case of the employment contract’s suspension in the conditions of martial law. Within the framework of the study, the author considers both theoretical and practical issues of the institute of suspension of employment relations. At the same time, the main attention is paid to the peculiarities of the suspension of employment contracts during the legal regime of martial law, as well as to the problems of implementing the right of employees to protection in case of violation of legal grounds for such suspension by employers. It is emphasized that for the legality of the suspension of the employment contract in the conditions of martial law, the simultaneous presence of several conditions is necessary, such as: 1) the fact of armed aggression and the existence of the legal regime of martial law; 2) absolute impossibility of providing work by the employer and performing work by the employee. At the same time, the lack of a relevant legal norm is the absence of a clear definition or at least signs of the impossibility of the parties to the employment contract fulfilling their obligations. It has been proven that the labour legislation should not only clearly state the conditions and procedure for suspending the employment contract, but also establish the employer's financial responsibility to the employee in the form of average earnings for forced absenteeism in the event that such suspension is recognized as illegal. In particular, in the case of the cancellation of the suspension of the employment contract by the court in connection with the employer's violation of the labor legislation when it was issued (for example, the suspension of the employment contract was introduced at the initiative of the employer without sufficient grounds for this), the implementation of the right to protect the violated rights of the employee should include not only the cancellation of the order and the restoration of the employment contract, but also the reimbursement by the employer of the average earnings during the period of forced absenteeism, by analogy with Article 235 of the Labor Code of Ukraine, according to the second part of which, when making a decision on reinstatement, the body that considers a labor dispute simultaneously takes decision to pay the employee the average salary for the period of forced absenteeism.