“Slippage”, “violation” of the freedom to work … Several union organizations stepped up to the plate this Friday to challenge the provisions of the anti-Covid-19 bill, which opens the way to possible dismissals for lack of health pass.
The text, adopted on first reading by the National Assembly in the early hours of the morning and which must now be examined in the Senate, provides for employees and public officials who find themselves without a health pass in positions where it will become mandatory a procedure of suspension of the employment contract without remuneration, which ends when the employee produces “the required supporting documents”. The employee can take days off or RTT, or even see with the employer if he can be temporarily assigned to another position.
The text adds that “the fact that an employee can no longer exercise his activity for a cumulative period exceeding the equivalent of two months of working days due to non-compliance with the obligation to present supporting documents, certificates and results (required) may be a specific reason constituting a real and serious cause of dismissal ”. The system is similar for employees subject to compulsory vaccination.
Vaccination is the most effective way to fight #pandemic, BUT the CFE-CGC is in total opposition to the provision on the dismissal of the #Health Pass.
We urge @gouvernementFR to redact the draft text of this measure.https://t.co/AkApy7KPF8
– CFE-CGC (@CFECGC) July 23, 2021
A “slippage”
In a statement, the CFE-CGC denounced Friday a “slippage”. “It is transgressive, dangerous and worrying to see for the first time a reason for dismissal at the expense of the employee for a reason relating to his private life”, writes the union, urging the government to “come to his senses”.
[#Communiqué] #HealthCrisis – FO disputes the threats of sanctions and dismissals. pic.twitter.com/oJZdnpyYZC
– force_ouvriere (@force_ouvriere) July 23, 2021
FO also “disputes” that “the policy implemented to accelerate and extend vaccination or to ensure the required protections, necessary in the face of the occurrence of the Delta variant, is based on the threat of sanctions going as far as the dismissal of employees. concerned either by compulsory vaccination or working in places subject to the health pass ”.
On Wednesday, the CGT had also ruled in a statement that “the target to be fought must be the virus, not the employees”, denouncing a text “which would undermine their freedom to work”.
“We call on parliamentarians to measure all the social consequences that this law, if it were passed, would have, almost exclusively, on employees by imposing sanctions. Sanctions which could go as far as the suspension of their remuneration or even their dismissal, ”the union wrote.