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Deconfinement: can an employee refuse to return to work for fear of contracting the coronavirus? (video)

Many companies will be able to restart from Monday. In all cases, teleworking will remain the rule when possible. But can an employee refuse to return physically to his workplace?

If working conditions are dangerous to an employee’s health, he can use what is known as the right of withdrawal. Because just like in France, this provision exists in Belgian law. But according to Sophie Remouchamps, a lawyer specializing in labor law, this right of withdrawal is not a right to refuse to return to work. “The worker must go to his place of work, find that he is exposed to a serious and immediate danger, and from this observation, he can leave his post and leave his place of work to protect from danger, enlightens the specialist. So the idea is really to protect his physical integrity, his health, his human being. “


> CORONAVIRUS in Belgium: all info

If the employer provides all the security measures, the right of withdrawal can hardly be invoked

And to avoid using this provision, the employer must first negotiate working conditions with the workers. “The only way that the employer can cope with the practical exercise of the right of withdrawal by one or more workers, everyone being exposed to a danger which concerns him individually, is to put in place the measures of prevention is applying the rules on health and safety at work “, continues Sophie Remouchamps.

This right has never been used in Belgium

In the absence of security measures, the employee can therefore leave his workplace without any reduction in salary or risk of sanction. But mobilizing the right of withdrawal remains complicated. Because it has never been used in Belgium before. For this union organization, it is even too early to use it. “We should now take a law which would transpose the application of this right of withdrawal which is in the code and which, therefore, would provide the modalities: in what solutions the person can appeal to this right? How should he do it ? With whom should she file her report? “, quotes Robert Vertenueil, president of the FGTB.

Another solution envisaged would be to appeal to the union organization of the company or even to contact the inspection of well-being at work.

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