ILAW Regional Conference – LI Input

On September 8-9, the ILAW Network held a regional convening in Warsaw, gathering about 30 participants from Europe and Central Asia. Labor Initiatives lawyers Nadiia Yolkina, Kateryna Shvets, and Alina Muzychenko joined SC Regional Program Director Rudy Porter and SC Ukraine Country Program Director Tristan Masat at the ILAW conference.

LI lawyers had an opportunity to speak about telework (remote work) regulations in Ukraine in comparison with other regional countries, as well as to present the recent report on telework in Ukraine drafted by LI attorneys Inna Kudinska and George Sandul.

Ukraine is among the few countries whose legislation includes specific telework clauses. The adoption of remote work regulations in 2021 in Ukraine served as a lifeline for millions of Ukrainians who were forced to relocate to another region of Ukraine or flee the country and saved their jobs by enabling them to work remotely. Laws regulating labor relations under martial law (in particular, Law of Ukraine No.2136) do not create separate provisions in respect of remote/home-based work; therefore, the legislative norms adopted in 2021 remain in effect. Still, based on the practice of the LI legal clinic, legislation on telework could be amended in terms of cross-border remote work, prevention of burnout and overload for remote workers, and compensation for utility bills during work at the home office (electricity, internet, water, etc.). 

Moreover, LI lawyers contributed to other sessions of the two-day conference, such as platform work and guarantees for workers in this sector, discrimination in the workplace, informal economy workers’ rights protection, and labor intermediaries.