The Irish government recently published a bill introducing the mandatory automatic enrollment of eligible employees into a central government-run defined contribution pension fund. Auto-enrolment is expected to take effect in January 2025, once the bill is passed.
The Netherlands has embarked on sweeping pension reform that will affect most employer-sponsored and industry-wide pension plans and require significant effort from employers, employee representatives, pension providers, and asset managers over the next several years to amend schemes by the 1 January 2028 deadline. Employers should begin their transition planning now.
With the rise of technology, work from home has been a steadily growing trend for many years. Remote working has exploded since Spring 2020 with quarantines, workplace closures, and lockdowns due to the COVID-19 pandemic, at least for jobs and industries that do not always require workers to be on-site.
This abrupt, worldwide shift to remote work has sparked new logistical and structural legal challenges that have warranted many countries to pass teleworking legislation, some of which are summarized in this article.
New teleworking legislation varies widely across countries. While some countries introduced their first teleworking general legal framework, other countries passed more detailed measures. This article will only cover permanent teleworking legislation that has entered into effect since the beginning of the pandemic in March 2020. Temporary COVID-19 related measures, as well as proposed legislation not yet passed as of the publication of this article will not be addressed.
As combat operations continue in Gaza, there have been several developments affecting the workplace, employee rights, and employer obligations in Israel.
Cyprus has extended maternity leave entitlements for first-time birthing mothers, first-time adopting mothers, and mothers whose newborn is hospitalized for 14 or more days for health reasons. The extended leave provisions enacted by the Protection of Maternity (amendment) Law of 2024 apply to female employees who are on maternity leave or commencing maternity leave from 1 March 2024.