Fundamental conclusions of The Court of Justice of the European Union

The Court of Justice of the European Union ("CJEU") in its judgment of 2 March 2023 in Case C-477/21 (MÁV-START Vasúti Személyszállító Zrt.) made fundamental conclusions regarding the provision of uninterrupted weekly rest and uninterrupted daily rest to employees.

This judgment provides an interpretation that is likely to be of fundamental importance for the planning of employee shifts in the Czech Republic as well, especially for shift work. Allow us to point out a few conclusions from the cited CJEU decision

1. Legislation in EU Member States must ensure that every worker is entitled to (i) a minimum daily rest period of at least 11 consecutive hours in a 24-hour period and (ii) a minimum continuous rest period of 24 hours in each 7-day period.
2. Daily rest cannot be considered as part of the weekly rest period, as these are two entirely separate rights, and each Member State or employer is thus obliged to ensure that each of these rights is actually implemented.
3. If the national legislation of a Member State provides for a weekly rest period longer than 24 hours (i.e. longer than the relevant Directive), workers must still be granted the right to daily rest.
4. Rest is taken immediately after working hours.
5. If an employee is to be granted a weekly rest period, this period may commence after the employee has exhausted the daily rest period.
6. The employee is entitled to a daily rest period, regardless of whether or not this is followed by a working period (i.e. regardless of whether it is followed by a weekly rest period).

Transposition of the CJEU's conclusions into Czech labour law:

The Czech Labour Code (Act No. 262/2006 Coll., Labour Code, as amended) stipulates the obligation to provide continuous rest between two shifts (§ 90), as a transposition of daily rest, and continuous rest during the week (§ 92), as a transposition of the minimum weekly rest period.

In the case of continuous rest between shifts, the Labour Code provides for the right of an employee to rest between the end of a shift and the beginning of a shift for a minimum of 11 hours (for employees under 18 years of age for a minimum of 12 hours).

Uninterrupted weekly rest must be provided for a minimum of 35 hours (for minors, this period may not be less than 48 hours).

It appears that the Czech legislators included 24 hours of the minimum required by the European Directive and 11 hours of uninterrupted rest between shifts in the 35-hour minimum weekly rest period.  

This led, among other things, to the fact that if an employee took a minimum of 35 hours of continuous weekly rest between shifts, the rest between shifts was no longer provided (it was considered to be "hidden" in the weekly continuous rest).

Following the interpretation given by the CJEU, it will no longer be possible to proceed in this way.

If this situation arises in practice, it will be necessary to give the employee both types of rest, with the right to daily rest being taken first and then the right to the minimum weekly rest period, if such situation occurs (for the purpose of this summary, we disregard possibility of the employer to shorten, under certain circumstances, the rest provided and compensate for it later).