Employment 2025

PORTUGAL Law and Practice Contributed by: Nuno Ferreira Morgado and Júlia Mendes da Costa, PLMJ

• To provide financial and social services to their members. • To participate in the drafting of employment laws. • To represent their affiliated workers at company level and appoint union representatives. • To participate in dismissal proceedings that con - cern their affiliated workers. • To receive information and be consulted about: (a) recent and probable future evolution of the company’s activity; (b) probable evolution of employment; (c) any decision that may entail a material change in the work organisation of employment con - tracts; and (d) participating in company restructuring pro - cesses, particularly where training measures or changes in working conditions are planned. 6.2 Employee Representative Bodies The employees of a company may (although it is not mandatory) take the initiative to set up the following representative bodies. • Works council – the members are appointed by the employees and their purpose is to represent the interests of the employees of that company. In most companies in Portugal, there is no works council; they are only found in larger companies. • Union delegates – elected by employees affiliated with a specific union; there can be more than one union with representation in a company. • Security and health representatives – to supervise issues relating to security and health. They are not common in Portugal. • European Works Council (EWC). Representatives of employees are entitled to time off to perform their duties and may convene general meetings of employees either outside or within work - ing hours (in the latter case, for a maximum of 15 hours a year). Works councils have information and consultation rights, such as: • the right to obtain information on some matters of relevance for the company/employees;

• the right to consultation on some specific mat - ters of relevance for the employees, as defined by the law, but they do not have the right of veto in respect of any employer’s decisions; • the right to meet periodically with the management; and • the right to negotiate a collective labour agreement specific to the company, provided that the unions representing the company’s employees delegate that power to the works council (this is not com - mon). 6.3 Collective Bargaining Agreements At the industry level, CBAs are common in almost all sectors. Since CBAs usually provide more favourable employment conditions than the Employment Code, they will prevail. However, there are some specific matters where the law is mandatory and the CBA cannot overrule them. These matters mainly involve termination of employment contracts. Employment contracts cannot, in principle, provide conditions that are less favourable than the ones established by a CBA. The parties to a collective agreement may agree that a particular provision is one from which there can be no derogation. 7. Termination 7.1 Grounds for Termination The employer may be entitled to terminate the employ - ment contract by dismissal: • with just cause; In addition, during the trial period, either employer or employee may terminate the contract without prior notice (save if the trial period has lasted more than 60 days, in which case the employer must give prior notice of seven days) or just cause. There is no right to any compensation unless otherwise agreed in writing. Term contracts lapse at the end of their term, provided the employer or the employee respectively notifies the • on grounds of redundancy; or • on grounds of failure to adapt.

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