Decent Work Agenda - Comparative Chart
To mark the entry into force of this legislative reform, CoLABOR is providing a comparative table, comparing the previous legal wording with the one that came into force on May 1, 2023, highlighting the purely formal changes, the substantive ones and the introduction of new rules, according to a color system that will make the document easier to read.
In the first decade of the 21st century, the ILO developed an Agenda based on four objectives considered strategic by the organization: job creation; guaranteeing rights at work; extending social protection; and promoting social dialogue.
As part of the work of the World Commission on the Social Dimension of Globalization, Decent Work was recognized as a fundamental principle for Fair Globalization.
In this context, the ILO Declaration on Social Justice for a Fair Globalization was adopted at the 2008 International Labour Conference, and the objective of Decent Work was subsequently included in the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development.
With this context in mind, the Portuguese government has established a set of priorities for regulating the labor market with a view to promoting the concept of decent work.
After several prior discussions within the CPCS, the final version of the "Decent Work Agenda and Valuing Young People in the Labor Market" was presented in May 2022.
Subsequently, its content was incorporated into Bill no.The preamble to Law No. 15/XV states that the legislative amendment in question "marks not only a specific concern for young people and young adults, whose situation and prospects are particularly affected by exposure to atypical forms of employment and by the occurrence of a second major crisis in the space of a decade, but also the dimension of living conditions and non-wage income, ensuring a better framework for young people entering the labor market and promoting sustainable transitions to working life, but also a set of structural challenges, such as combating precariousness, in the most affected segments and particularly in its most extreme forms, improving workers' incomes, mobilizing new instruments to stimulate collective bargaining and prevent negotiation gaps, promoting a more balanced balance between professional, family and personal life and responding to the changes in work induced by the digital transition, as well as strengthening public services in the area of labour and social security." These are the stated objectives of the labor reform.
After its approval in the Assembly of the Republic and promulgation by the President of the Republic, Law no. 13/2023 was published in the Official Gazette on April 3, 2023.
Its entry into force will be marked by two distinct moments: on May 1, 2023, a substantial part of the legislative changes approved as part of this reform will come into force, in particular the changes to the Labor Code, and, at a later date, on June 3, 2023, a number of other scattered pieces of legislation and, hopefully, the regulation of a number of matters listed in the Code.