Draft Law of Ukraine

"On Amendment of the Law of Ukraine "On Remuneration of Labor"

This draft stipulates that the collective bargaining agreement, in exceptional cases, may provide for in kind repayment of wages. However, in such instances in-kind wage repayment shall not exceed 20% of the monthly wage (now it is allowed to repay in-kind up to 50% of the monthly wage).

According to this draft workers shall be guaranteed the right to stop their work in the event wage arrears cover the period of more than 15 days and not to work during the entire period until repayment of delayed wage. However, it should be mentioned that prior to such actions owner of his/her assignees should be notified in writing thereof. This draft also specifies the following instances when such stoppages of work are prohibited.

• during the state of emergency or martial law;
• for the bodies of the Armored Forces of Ukraine, organizations in charge of the national defense and security, wrecking activities, rescue and recovery services, fire fighting service and law enforcement bodies;
• state employees;
• enterprises, institutions and organizations directly involved in maintenance of productions with especially dangerous conditions of work;
• enterprises, institutions and organizations securing normal living conditions of population (energy provision, heating, water supply, gas supply, communication, first-aid/emergency stations).

The goal of this draft is to raise the level of legal protection of hired workers against violation of wage repayment terms. But it should be mentioned that adoption of this draft would not allow resolving problem with in-time repayment of wages because stoppage of work by employees will aggravate the economic situation of the enterprise. It should be mentioned that failure to come to work (without any valid reason) is considered to be violation of labor discipline.

It should be also pointed out that now there are available legal mechanisms for fighting wage arrears. In particular, these are the norms of the Criminal Code of Ukraine, Ukraine’s Code of Administrative Offences, Labor Code of Ukraine, which provide for criminal, administrative and disciplinary responsibility that shall be incurred by administrators of enterprises for wage arrears, as well as the Law of Ukraine "On Procedure for Resolving Collective Labor Disputes (Conflicts)" that determines legal and organizational principles for resolving collective labor disputes (conflicts) and is directed to interaction of the parties to social-labor relations in the process of solving collective labor disputes (conflicts) which arise between them.