Transformation of a mandate into an employment contract
An MP bill amending the National Labour Inspectorate Act and the Civil Procedure Code Act (print No. 1134) provides for the possibility of granting the National Labour Inspectorate the authority to independently change a civil law relationship between the parties (for example, a contract of mandate) into an employment relationship.
According to the draft, a labor inspector will be authorized to ascertain the existence of an employment relationship whenever he finds that a civil law agreement linking the parties has the characteristics of such a relationship. Such a determination is to be made by way of a written decision issued by the inspector. The draft provides that such decision is to include the amount of remuneration. The decision is to be appealed to the district labour court. In the current legal state, the situation is the opposite – it is the labour inspector who can turn to the court to establish the existence of an employment relationship.
The proposed changes would eliminate the so-called „junk contracts,” which are often characterized by features characteristic for an employment contract, and enable the State Labour Inspectorate to enforce labour law more effectively.
In practice, such construction of provisions would enable labour inspectors to change mandate agreements into employment contracts in a situation when a contractor or a self-employed person performs work in conditions actually corresponding to an employment relationship.
The draft has now been referred for the first reading in the Sejm. There has already been a government position on the matter, negatively assessing the parliamentary draft.