HRlaw.pl - Labour and employment law

On 27 November 2025, the Standing Committee of the Council of Ministers adopted a draft bill amending the provisions of the Labour Code on mobbing. This is in response to comments submitted to earlier bills, which we have covered in articles on the first bill and amendments to it. Although the latest version is only a slight modification of the earlier, if enacted, it will place further obligations on employers.

An employee's return to work following an extended period of parental leave presents significant challenges for both the employee and the employer. The Labour Code affords returning employees protection and grants them additional rights designed to facilitate a seamless transition back to the workplace, thereby imposing a range of corresponding obligations on employers.

The principle of non-discrimination has been in force in Polish labour law for over 20 years. At the same time, there is a noticeable tendency to specify and expand provisions in this area. Soon, on 24 December 2025, the principle of non-discrimination will be reinforced once again – by adding art. 18^3ca to the Labour Code. The adoption of art. 18^3ca LC relates to partial implementation of European Parliament and Council (EU) Directive 2023/970.

This provision introduces rules on transparency regarding remuneration at the recruitment stage. However, it also stipulates that: The employer shall ensure that job advertisements and job titles are gender-neutral and that the recruitment process is non-discriminatory. We focus in this article on new duties of employers in this regard.

The COVID-19 pandemic significantly affected work organisation, particularly in the services sector, but also in white-collar and administrative/office work. To reduce the risk of infection, where possible, many employees switched to remote working, and business meetings became virtual. This model quickly gained popularity and was gradually implemented more widely, even after the peak of the pandemic had passed.

After numerous comments were made during the opinion process on a draft act about which we wrote in the article Draft new definition of mobbing = new obligations for employers, the Ministry of Family, Labour and Social Policy on 5 June 2025 published a new version of the draft on the Governmental Legislation Centre website.

Compared to the previous version, the bill contains several changes to regulations aimed at systematising the definition of mobbing, as well as introducing legal solutions that are new to Polish labour law, such as the employer's right to claims against the perpetrator of mobbing.

In recent years, employers have increasingly made diversity & inclusion (D&I) a part of their HR strategy. Recent changes in the social and political climate might suggest that D&I is losing relevance. Nonetheless, it is important to remember that employment legislation itself plays a significant role in building an inclusive and diverse work environment. Indeed, D&I is not just the domain of soft HR actions: its pillars are embedded in the provisions of the Labour Code.

Rights of trade unions

Under the Act on Trade Unions, the rights of a trade union depend on the level of its membership.

The required levels of membership are:

• at least 10 members for a workplace trade union,
• a total of at least 10 members across all the employers spanned by an inter-workplace trade union (it is sufficient for a given employer to have one employee as a member of an inter-workplace trade union for that union to enjoy trade union rights).

In 2024, Polish courts received a significant number of labour law cases. Statistics published by the Ministry of Justice show that over 100,000 cases were brought to labour courts in 2024.

Parliament is currently analysing the Report on Activities of the State Labour Inspectorate for 2024. The document contains the latest data on detected and adjudicated misdemeanours and crimes against employee rights. The report also presents trends in the prosecution of perpetrators of acts violating labour rights, in particular information on the effectiveness of inspectors' work and the condition of criminal proceedings in Poland.

A PIP inspection need not cause great concern - the key is proper preparation. Clear internal organisation, knowledge of the applicable legislation and awareness of the labour inspector’s rights will effectively streamline the inspection process.

In 2025, PIP plans to carry out 55,000 inspections at workplaces. The Chief Labour Inspector has stated that these will concern, in particular, the employment of foreign citizens, remote work, equal pay and the protection of whistleblowers.

In order to minimise the risk of the inspection revealing irregularities, it is worthwhile analysing in advance the company's internal procedures and document templates used.

The holiday season can cause considerable organisational challenges for employers. On the one hand, they should provide employees with time to rest, while on the other, they must ensure there is no interruption of operations, such as key business processes and customer service.

On 20 January 2025, the Ministry of Family, Labour and Social Policy published a draft act amending the Labour Code on the website of the Governmental Legislation Centre. The amendments are intended to clarify the definition of mobbing, which has existed in the Polish legal system for over 20 years, and to impose new obligations on employers.

Mediation is one of the ways of amicably resolving disputes, including labour law disputes. In practice, mediation is generally carried out in all types of labour disputes, in particular in cases concerning employment contract termination, payment of bonuses or other employment dues, bullying or sexual harassment.

The legal nature of the relationship between a company and its management board (MB) member often has a number of aspects. Primary is the corporate aspect of the appointment to the MB (usually under a resolution of a meeting of shareholders or supervisory board). The second involves a board member’s rights and obligations while working for the company. In the latter, MB members with employment contracts have a specific situation, with the most complicated aspect arising when terminating their employment.

The Ministry of Family, Labour and Social Policy has drawn up a bill modifying the existing definition of mobbing which has been in effect for more than 20 years. The bill amending the provisions of the Labour Code (UD183) was published on the Government Legislation Centre’s website on 20 January 2025. It  alters concepts and provisions related to undesirable behaviour in the workplace, such as discrimination, unequal treatment and mobbing. How will the change in the definition of mobbing affect employers and employees?

Nagrywanie rozmów, które pracownicy call center prowadzą z klientami, prowadzi do przetwarzania danych osobowych pracowników przez pracodawcę jako administratora danych osobowych. W zależności od zastosowanych rozwiązań technicznych dane te będą obejmować samą treść słów wypowiadanych przez pracownika (i jego rozmówcę) lub, dodatkowo, metadane związane z nagrywaną rozmową (np. czas trwania czy godzina rozpoczęcia i zakończenia).

Chatbots and voicebots are being increasingly used for interactions between employers and employees. They help employers meet their obligations to employees, such as serving as a tool to provide information about procedures at the employer or how to carry out certain tasks. They also help in managing employment, as a communications tool for basic HR issues.

Employers, especially those that are part of foreign groups, sometimes wish to carry out background checks, to analyse information concerning the circumstances or status of job candidates or employees beyond the extent of their legal right to do so.

The aim of Directive 2023/970 (i.e. Directive (EU) 2023/970 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 10 May 2023 on enhancing the application of the principle of equal pay for men and women for equal work or work of equal value through pay transparency and enforcement mechanisms) is to reduce and, in the long term, eliminate the gender pay gap in the EU, which was still 12.7% in 2022.

The under-representation of women in the highest decision-making bodies of companies in the EU was the trigger for the Women on Boards Directive (Directive (EU) 2022/2381 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 23 November 2022 on improving gender balance among directors of listed companies and related measures).

The Directive intends to ensure that women and men enjoy equal opportunities as well as a more balanced representation in top management. In view of their economic and social responsibilities and their significant impact on the market, the largest listed companies are now required to introduce measures that ensure a balance between genders.

A bill is currently being drafted in Poland to implement the Women on Boards Directive, which will affect recruitment and hiring policies and HR processes.

On October 15, main ideas appeared on the list of legislative and programmatic work of the Council of Ministers in a document entitled “Take back control. Ensure Security. Poland's Comprehensive and Responsible Migration Strategy for 2025-2030.” Just two days later. on October 17, the full text of the strategy was published. The strategy is intended to set directions for changes in immigration law in terms of, among other things:  

The law protects employees who are absent due to illness from dismissal, if they return to work before the end of the period set down in law. Only a sufficiently long and, in principle, uninterrupted absence due to sickness allows the employer to terminate the contract immediately with an employee who is unfit to work. As a result, situations arise, in practice, in which employees take sick leave “on and off”, interrupting long periods of absence by returning for a few days to work. On the one hand, this is supposed to guarantee further protection against dismissal while, on the other, to ensure that the benefit for being unable to work is received for as long as possible. Nevertheless, it turns out that this strategy will not always prevent the employer from letting the employee go.

When an employee has been absent for a long period of time, or in other circumstances where an employer is having difficulties contacting an employee via official means of communication, HR departments often wonder whether they can use an employee's private contact data. Some more cautious employers introduce employee questionnaires requesting a private e-mail address or telephone number, or collect this data from employees in a different way. How does the issue of obtaining private contact data look from a data protection law perspective?

Helping employees to raise their professional qualifications is a basic duty of employers and is also one of the cornerstones of labour law. Employee training is an integral part of today’s labour market, in which technological developments and the associated changes in how work is organised are, essentially, forcing upskilling and retraining. This topic is also particularly relevant to the policies that employers draw up, which increasingly offer subsidised training to employees as a benefit encouraging them accept offers of jobs or to remain in employment.