International Workers' Day is marked on May 1 and World Day for Safety and Health at Work is marked on April 28. By responding to these days, we would like to emphasize the problems and challenges in the field of labour rights in order to raise awareness of these issues on the one hand and increase the sensitivity of the responsible agencies on the other hand.

Ensuring safe working environment is one of the most serious challenges in Georgia. Hopefully, improvement of the current situation will be an irreversible process after August 1, when sanctions envisaged by the Law on Safety at Work will take effect. At the same time, it is important to further develop labour safety regulations in order to improve the health and life of each employee in the workplace.

The Public Defender constantly underlines the deficiencies in the Labour Code as well. Specifically, the Code does not define the limit of working hours, working days, overtime hours, or comprehensive list of grounds for terminating labour relations. The amount of minimum adequate wage has not been defined either. The practice of enforcement of the applicable labour legislation is problematic as well. Even though there are a number of legislative safeguards, they are not often fulfilled in practice.

The Public Defender continues to monitor labour rights in the country and will use all available means to improve the current situation.