News Flash

The Bulgarian minimum wage rose on May 1st from BGN 270 to BGN 290 (148.27 euros) a month. Trade unions are pressing the government to raise the minimum wage still further to BGN 330 (168.73 euros) by 2013.

Germany’s leading coalition party, the CDU, has decided to introduce a mandatory minimum wage covering all sectors of the economy. Agreement has yet to be reached with the other two coalition parties, but the CDU proposal would involve the establishment

The European Commission has proposed a new directive to simplify the re-registration of cars moving permanently between EU member states. The proposition would allow for vehicles to be registered in the member state where the owner ‘normally resides’. Citizens who

The Italian government has approved a number of important employment law reforms. These clamp down on the misuse of flexible employment contracts and make it easier to carry out
individual redundancies. In return, several improvements have been introduced to the

Although employment in service-based businesses across the EU was hard hit by the recent recession, growth has now resumed – albeit not yet at pre-recession levels. By contrast, employment in the construction sector grew by 15% between Q1 2004 and

Irish minister Brendan Howlin has announced that the government is drawing up a draft Bill on Protected Disclosures in the Public Interest.

This new legislation is designed to protect whistleblowers who report what they genuinely perceive as possible criminal offences

The German Federal Labour Court has declared that it is discriminatory to vary annual leave allowances according to an employee’s age – even if the scaling of allowances is set out in a collective agreement.

According to the agreement in

The French Supreme Court has recently ruled that dismissing a state careworker who lived 20km away from their workplace – instead of the 200 metres maximum distance stipulated in their employment contract – was unlawful. According to rights afforded under

An amendment to the Bulgarian Commercial Code has been proposed that would give employees the right to submit a claim as a priority creditor if their company files for bankruptcy.

Current legal provisions allow bankruptcy proceedings to be initiated by

The UK’s Office of National Statistics has just issued its latest figures from the 2011 Annual Survey of Hours and Earnings. These reveal that although the gender hourly pay gap (excluding overtime) for all employees stood last April at 20.2%

According to the European statistical agency Eurostat real pay levels fell by 0.4% in the eurozone over the year to Q4  2011. Average earnings rose by 2.5%, but prices rose over the same period by  2.9%.

Changes in average earnings

The Dutch parliament has adopted a bill to change the commencement date of the state old age pension. With effect from April 1st 2012 state pensions will commence on the actual day that a person reaches the age of 65

Vodafone Spain and employees representatives have reached an agreement aimed at avoiding the company opting for a labour-adjustment plan (ERE) or seeking to outsource many of its activities. The company’s 4,000 employees will now take two weeks unpaid leave each

Swiss voters have rejected a proposal to extend the mandatory period of paid annual leave from four to six weeks. 66.5% of voters in a national referendum were against the plan and the turnout level was low – at just

The Dutch job centre and benefits agency UWV has reported that they filled only 2,000 permanent positions last year compared with 83,000 in 2010. However The number of short-term job contracts for periods of longer than one year grew from