Criterion on the application of the measures of suspension and reduction of working hours during the phase of unconfinement of the alarm state
According to an agreement in the Council of Ministers, it is convenient to clarify how workers and companies should proceed in relation to the emergency labor measures provided for in Royal Decree-Law 8/2020, particularly in relation to the so-called “measures for the flexibility of mechanisms of temporary adjustment of activity to avoid layoffs ”.
After this exceptional period, the need to reactivate the economy progressively, through the dynamisation of those sectors whose activity continues to be limited by the state of alarm.
It is therefore about implementing an adequate response so that companies adopt the necessary dynamic adjustments that allow them, from different starting points and degrees of impact, to move to a "new normal" scenario.
The complete definition of the objective causes that make up the force majeure by COVID-19, established in article 22.1 of Royal Decree-Law 8/2020, thus responds to an external and peremptory cause whose effects and specific areas are decided at any time by the competent authorities for reasons of public health, which has the consequence that the different measures can be applied with a gradual and differentiated intensity and graduation.
This definition not only allows, but also makes it advisable, that the suspensions or reductions that have been adopted in accordance with a greater rigor in the requirement of confinement are being discontinued and modified in their scope according to the evaluation of the situation itself. health emergency, de-escalation forecasts and the factors to which it responds.
In this way, the companies that were applying the measures of suspension or reduction of working hours can renounce them, totally or partially, with respect to part or all of the workforce and progressively as the reasons linked to the Force Majeure. It will also be possible to alter the suspensive measure initially proposed and facilitate the transit towards the reductions in working hours, which suppose a lower economic impact on the worker and will allow to attend to the gradually increasing supply and demand of companies' products and services.
In this way, companies can recover all or part of their activity if, for the aforementioned reasons, workers return to perform their tasks fully or partially.
Documentary and procedural requirements must be essential. In this sense, it will suffice to notify the labor authority of the waiver of the authorized or communicated measure, in the face of a full recovery of the activity, and to transfer to the entity managing the benefits the situation of affection and disaffection of each of the workers , so that the temporary employment regulation file serves to guarantee a non-traumatic transit towards a future normality in which conjunctural measures are no longer necessary.