On June 29, 2021, the Chamber of Deputies adopted, as a decision-making Chamber, the legislative proposal (which complements Law no. 55/2020), through which employees who choose to be vaccinated will benefit, upon request, from one day paid on the day each dose of COVID-19 vaccine is given. The document proposes that exempt pupils, students, and military personnel should be exempted from attending the day they receive a dose of COVID-19 vaccine.
The day off will be granted, therefore, both at the initial vaccine dose and as a booster, for vaccines for which two doses are administered, and this day will benefit in addition to the days off.
Also, the pupils and students will benefit from a day of exemption from attendance on the day of vaccination, the same, for each dose of vaccine, carried out, according to the same project adopted by the deputies.
In addition, the active military personnel, soldiers and professional ranks will benefit, according to the project, from “one day of leave, for each dose of vaccine performed”.
We mention that they will be able to receive the mentioned free days, according to the legislative proposal adopted by the deputies, based on the vaccination certificate issued according to the law, as a justifying document proving the administration of the vaccine dose against COVID-19 on that day.
It is important to mention that, in the situation when the day off coincides with the day of vaccination, the respective persons have the obligation to submit the vaccination certificate on the first working day after vaccination.
According to the project, one of the parents of the child up to 18 years of age or his legal representative, “as well as the person with disabilities up to 26 years old, on the day of vaccination of the child, respectively the person with disabilities”, will be able to also benefit from a day off on each of the vaccination days.
In this sense, the respective parent will have to present to the employer both the child’s vaccination certificate and a statement on his / her own responsibility of the other parent, according to which he/she did not request, from his / her place of work, a day off for this purpose. In the case of single-parent families, the only person who has dependent children and who lives with her will have to mention in this respect in the declaration on his own responsibility, specifying that he is in one of the situations provided in art. 3 of Law no. 277/2010, in order to be included according to the definition of the single-parent family, namely:
- is unmarried;
- is a widow;
- is divorced;
- has his / her spouse declared/disappeared by a court decision;
- has the spouse remanded in custody for a period longer than 30 days or is serving a
custodial sentence and does not participate in the maintenance of children;
- has not reached the age of 18 and is in one of the above situations; or
- has been appointed a guardian or has been entrusted or placed in foster care with one or
more children and is unmarried, widowed or divorced.
As stated in the explanatory memorandum to the document, as “vaccination against the SARS CoV-2 virus is the main method of combating the effects of the pandemic”, this legislative proposal is a measure to encourage vaccination and eliminate possible obstacles to vaccination, related to labor relations.