A new phase of smartworking takes off
The Government and the Social Partners have defined a protocol, complementary to the legal provisions, which outlines guidelines for national, territorial or corporate contracts in the field of smart working.
The understanding, therefore, undersigned from the national confederations comparatively more representative, establishes which will be the criteria that will have to orient the future negotiation for the various categories and for the companies (with the express commitment of the confederations to encourage their respective category organisations to apply the Protocol).
The Protocol represents an innovation more with regard to the method - comparison with the social partners and greater involvement of collective negotiation - rather than merit, given that almost all the profiles considered (among the main: need of the individual agreement, places and working time, health and safety, disciplinary power, training) the parties have limited themselves to reiterate what already provided for by l. n. 81/2017, without intervening even on the discussed issue of disconnection.
What seems to interest the parties to the Protocol most, therefore, is to give impetus to collective negotiation at every level so that in the future they will participate in the definition of the rules of smart working.
In the short term, therefore, nothing changes in the regulation model of the institute, which remains subject to the provisions of Law n. 81 of 2017, including that which gives relevance exclusively to the individual agreement for the activation of agile work.
This does not mean, however, that the protocol will not have any concrete impact. Collective negotiation, in fact, is urged to intervene on the subject, with the possibility that important innovations will be introduced in the future contractually taking into account the specific peculiarities of each production sector or, again, territorial and business.
What will be the contents and arguments of this new negotiation? We will know it in the coming months.
