RECRUITMENT CODE AND PROFESSIONAL ETHICS
I) Framework
The Recruitment and Professional Ethics Code is a document that includes a set of ethical and deontological principles and concepts that should guide the unit in its recruitment policy and, fundamentally, in its attitude towards Equal Employment Opportunities.
“The employee or job applicant, in the private or public sector, has the right to equal opportunities and equal treatment as regards access to employment, training and professional promotion or career, and working conditions, and may not be privileged, benefited, prejudiced, deprived of any right, or exempted from any duty on the basis of ancestry, age sex, sexual orientation, marital status, family situation, economic situation, education, origin or social condition, genetic heritage, reduced work capacity, disability, chronic illness, nationality, ethnic origin or race, territory of origin, language, religion, political or ideological beliefs, and union membership, and the state must promote equal access to such rights. “
CITE – Commission for Equality in Work and Employment
II) Equality in Access to Employment, in the Workplace and in Professional Training
In matters of Equality in Access to Employment, at Work and in Professional Training, Naturisnor will always bear in mind that anyone applying for a job has the right to equal opportunities and equal treatment in matters of:
- Selection criteria and hiring conditions, in any sector of activity and at all hierarchical levels;
- Access to all types of professional guidance, training and retraining of any level, including the acquisition of practical experience;
- Remuneration and other benefits or compensation, promotion at all hierarchical levels and criteria for selecting workers to be dismissed;
- Membership or participation in collective representation structures, or any other organization whose members exercise a given profession, including the benefits provided by them;
- Legal provisions regarding the exercise of a professional activity by a foreigner or stateless person;
- Provisions concerning special protection of genetic heritage, pregnancy, parenthood, adoption and other situations concerning the reconciliation of work and family life.
Naturisnor will also take the following premises into consideration in its recruitment policy:
– The exclusion or restriction of access of a job applicant or employee, on the basis of gender, to a particular activity or to professional training constitutes discrimination on the basis of gender;
– Job offer advertisements and other advertising linked to pre-selection or recruitment may not contain, directly or indirectly, any restriction, specification or preference based on sex;
– Ensure equal employment conditions for local residents, minority groups, women, and people with different abilities;
– Establishing contracts will always be based on the criteria of equality and fairness;
– Naturisnor will contribute to the fight against the misuse of child labor, in order to prevent school drop-outs.
It should also be noted that, in the case of professional training courses aimed at jobs predominantly carried out by employees of one sex, preference will be given, whenever justified, to employees of the sex with less representation, as well as, if appropriate, to employees with reduced schooling, without qualifications or responsible for single-parent families or in the case of parental leave or adoption.
- REMUNERATION AND COMPENSATION
Naturisnor employees have the right to equal working conditions, in particular with regard to remuneration and salary, and the elements determining these should not contain any gender-based discrimination.
Equal pay or remuneration implies that for equal work or work of equal value:
– Any form of retribution or variable remuneration, particularly that paid on a piecework basis, is established on the basis of the same unit of measurement;
– The retribution or remuneration calculated according to the working time is the same;
– Differences in retribution or remuneration do not constitute discrimination when they are based on objective criteria, common to men and women, namely, based on merit, productivity, assiduity or seniority;
– Leave, absence or dispensations related to parental protection cannot be used as grounds for differences in pay or remuneration of workers;
– The job description and job evaluation systems must be based on objective criteria common to both men and women, in order to exclude any discrimination based on sex.
III) PROHIBITION OF DISCRIMINATION
- Concept of direct discrimination:
“Direct discrimination shall be deemed to exist whenever a person is subjected to less favorable treatment than that which is, has been, or will be given to another person in a comparable situation.” CITE – Commission for Equality in Labor and Employment - Concept of indirect discrimination:
“Indirect discrimination shall be deemed to exist where an apparently neutral provision, criterion or practice is liable to place a person, by reason of a discriminating factor, at a disadvantage compared with others, unless that provision, criterion or practice is objectively justified by a legitimate aim and the means of achieving it are appropriate and necessary.” CITE – Commission for Equality in Labor and Employment
Therefore, Naturisnor will not practice any type of discrimination, direct or indirect, in accordance with the points below:
- The act of retaliation that harms the employee as a result of rejection or submission to a discriminatory act is invalid;
- The mere order or instruction with the purpose of harming someone due to a discrimination factor constitutes discrimination;
- Dismissal or any other sanction applied allegedly to punish an infraction is presumed to be abusive, when it takes place up to a year after a complaint or other form of exercising rights concerning equality and non-discrimination;
- Naturisnor may not, under any circumstances, require a job applicant or employee to undergo or present pregnancy tests or examinations. The doctor responsible for the tests and medical examinations can only communicate to the employer whether or not the employee is fit to perform the job;
- It is up to the person alleging discrimination to indicate the worker or workers in relation to whom he/she considers him/herself to be discriminated against and it is up to Naturisnor to prove that the difference in treatment is not based on any discriminatory factor. This applies in particular in the event of any discriminatory practice in access to employment or vocational training or in working conditions, namely for reasons of dispensation for prenatal consultation, protection of the safety and health of pregnant workers, workers who have recently given birth or are breastfeeding, parental leave or absence to care for minors;
- Behavior based on a discriminatory factor which constitutes a justifiable and determining requirement for the exercise of a professional activity, by virtue of the nature of the activity in question or the context in which it is carried out, and the objective must be legitimate and the requirement proportionate, shall not constitute discrimination;
- A legislative measure of limited duration that benefits a certain group disadvantaged by a discriminatory factor, with the objective of guaranteeing the exercise, on equal terms, of the rights provided by law or correcting a situation of inequality that persists in social life, is not considered to be discrimination.
IV) HARASSMENT
Naturisnor will not practice harassment of any kind taking into account:
- Concept of harassment:
“Harassment is any unwanted behavior, in particular that based on a discriminatory factor, practiced when accessing employment or in one’s own job, work or vocational training, with the aim or effect of disturbing or constraining a person, affecting his/her dignity, or creating an intimidating, hostile, degrading, humiliating or destabilizing environment for him/her.” CITE – Commission for Equality in Labor and Employment - Concept of sexual harassment:
“Sexual harassment is any unwanted behavior of a sexual nature, in verbal, non-verbal or physical form, with the purpose or effect of disturbing or embarrassing a person, affecting his/her dignity, or creating an intimidating, hostile, degrading, humiliating or destabilizing environment for him/her.” CITE – Commission for Equality in Work and Employment
V) GOOD PRACTICES FOR EQUALITY AT WORK AND IN EMPLOYMENT
A good practice in terms of Gender Equality at work and in employment is the result of an idea, preferably innovative, that is presented as a solution to a certain problem in a certain context.
For Naturisnor, these practices, in their design and implementation, should be participatory, appropriate and useful for the employees and for the unit, accessible, appropriate and sustainable over time.
Naturisnor is increasingly taking on the promotion of gender equality and the conciliation of work, personal and family life in its Human Resources management policies.
The unit recognizes that investing in these matters is to opt for a strategy that brings benefits and competitive advantages as a company made up of both men and women workers.
Axes and areas of intervention to be taken into account
- Gender equality
- Conciliation of professional, family and personal life
When preparing its annual plan for conciliation and the consequent implementation of measures, Naturisnor will base its intervention on lines of action that it considers the best Good Practices in terms of Gender Equality:
- Adoption of positive discrimination measures in favor of the underrepresented sex in recruitment and selection;
- Systematically promoting the hiring of men and women for areas where they are under-represented;
- Systematic processing of all information regarding the entity’s human resources, disaggregated by sex;
- Implementation of Action Plans for Equality;
- Use of inclusive language and images in all the entity’s internal and external communication processes;
- Promotion of internal training and awareness-raising actions on gender equality covering the largest number of workers of the different professional levels and categories of the entity, including for management positions;
- Sensitizing female students to enter areas of technology and engineering where they are under-represented;
- Include in the satisfaction evaluation mechanisms (social and organizational climate) to the workers issues regarding Gender Equality and Conciliation;
- Adoption of specific measures that favor the reintegration into active life of workers who have interrupted their career for family reasons
- Adoption of norms that ensure respect for the dignity of men and women in the workplace and that protect them in case of unwanted behavior, manifested verbally, physically, sexually or otherwise, also creating remedial measures;
- Adoption of measures to reduce the pay gap between women and men in the organization.
VI) APPLICATION
The present Recruitment and Professional Ethics Code comes into force immediately after approval by the Unit’s management and its dissemination to all employees and partners.
- APPLICABLE LEGISLATION
Law nr. 7/2009, of February 12th – D.R., IS, nr. 30, 12/02/2009
Approves the revision of the Labor Code
(With the amendment introduced by Law nr. 47/2012, 29 August, and rectified by Rectification Declaration nr. 21/2009, 18 March)
Labour Code
(With the amendments introduced by Law no. 105/2009, of 14 September, Law no. 53/2011, of 14 October, Law no. 23/2012, of 25 June, Law no. 47/2012, of 29 August, Law no. 69/2013, of 30 August, Law no. 27/2014, of 8 May, and Law no. 27/2014, of 8 May) No. 27/2014, of May 8, by Law No. 55/2014, of August 25, by Law No. 28/2015, of April 14, by Law No. 120/2015, of September 1, by Law No. 8/2016, of April 1, by Law No. 28/2016, of August 23, and by Law No. 73/2017, of August 16)
With regard to the payment in 2017 of Christmas and vacation subsidies in the private sector, please refer to article 274 of Law no. 42/2016, of December 28, which approves the State Budget for 2017.Decree-Law nr. 210/2015, of September 25, which proceeds with the first amendment to Law nr. 70/2013, of August 30, which establishes the legal systems of the labor compensation fund and the labor compensation guarantee fund
Decree Law nr. 59/2015, of April 21, which approves the new system of the Wage Guarantee Fund, provided for in article 336 of the Labor Code, approved by Law nr. 7/2009, of February 12, transposing Directive nr. 2008/94/EC, of the European Parliament and Council, of October 22, 2008, on the protection of employees in the event of the insolvency of their employer
Law no. 76/2013, of November 7, establishing a regime for the extraordinary renewal of fixed-term employment contracts, as well as the regime and method for calculating the compensation applicable to contracts subject to such renewal
Law no. 48-A/2014, of July 31, which extends the period of suspension of the provisions of collective bargaining instruments and employment contract clauses, making the second amendment to Law no. 23/2012, of June 25
Law no. 70/2013, of August 30, establishing the legal regimes of the labor compensation fund, the equivalent mechanism and the labor compensation guarantee fund
Law no. 3/2012, of January 10, establishing a regime for the extraordinary renewal of fixed-term employment contracts, as well as the regime and method for calculating the compensation applicable to contracts subject to such renewal
Code of Labour Procedure – Notes and rules on dismissal and equality and non-discrimination
Directive nr. 1460-C/2009 – D.R., IS, nr. 252, 2nd Supplement, 31/12/2009
Approves the model form for the lawsuit for judicial review of the regularity and lawfulness of the dismissal
Decree-Law nr. 76/2012, of March 26 – D.R., IS, nr. 61, 26/03/2012
Approves the organization of the Commission for Equality in Labor and Employment
Law no. 35/2014, of June 20 – D.R., IS, no. 117, 20/06/2014
(With the amendments introduced by Law No. 82-B/2014, of December 31, and Law No. 25/2017, of May 30)
General Law of Employment in Public Functions
(As amended by Law No. 84/2015, of August 7, Law No. 18/2016, of June 20, Law No. 42/2016, of December 28, Law No. 25/2017, of May 30, Law No. 70/2017, of August 14, and Law No. 73/2017, of August 16)
With regard to the specific mobility programs, payment of the Christmas allowance, strategy to combat precariousness and duration of mobility, during 2017, see, respectively, articles 23, 24, 25 and 26 of Law no. 42/2016, of December 28, which approves the State Budget for 2017
Law No. 25/2017, of May 30 – D.R., IS, No. 104/2017
Approves the regime of professional valorization of workers with a public employment bond, proceeds with the second amendment to Law No. 35/2014, of June 20, and the fourth amendment to the General Law on Work in Public Functions, and revokes Law No. 80/2013, of November 28
