Material scope

Access to vocational guidance and training, as well as issues of education in both the public and the private sectors are covered by the Labour Law which refers to “occupational training” and the Law on Education (2), which also applies to both the public and private sectors. The problem with the latter, however, is that it contains an exhaustive list of grounds which does not include age, disability (although it could be argued that the latter can be subsumed under the “health” heading) and sexual orientation. Education and training could also come under the Law on Consumer Protection, but the list of its prohibited grounds is limited to gender, race and ethnic origin. The same applied to the Law on the support to unemployed persons and job seekers covering the retraining.

The respective laws on membership of and involvement in organisations of workers or employers or in professional organisations do not always contain anti-discrimination clauses; while in relation to the former two the provision of the Labour law applies, professional organisations remain problematic and uncovered.

The field of social protection, including social security and healthcare, has been covered by the amendments to Law on Social Security adopted in December 2005; they do list age and disability (3), yet express reference to sexual orientation is missing. Also, this law defines social services as those provided by the state or municipality, hence it does not apply to the private sector.

Access to goods and services is covered as of 23 July 2008 by the amended Law on Consumer Protection. However, its list of prohibited grounds is limited to gender, race and ethnic origin, which as such is not contrary to the Directives, but shows the unwillingness to address the problem of discrimination in a wider context. The same applies to the Law on prohibition of discrimination of natural persons who are economic operators that prohibits discrimination on access to goods and services of persons who are economic operators, as well as access to self-employment – which raises a concern under Directive 2000/78.

(1) The complete list includes "“race, skin colour, age, disability, religious, political or other conviction, national or social origin, property or marital status, sexual orientation or other circumstances".
(2) Listing as prohibited grounds "property and social status, race, ethnicity, gender, religious or political opinions, health condition, occupation and place of residence".
(3) The list of prohibited grounds, with the exception of sexual orientation, is the same as in the Labour Law, see footnote 2.