4
On 26 September 2024, the Sino-German Legal Cooperation Programme organized an online dialogue in Beijing on the topic of “Prohibition of Discrimination in Labour Law” in cooperation with the Supreme People’s Court of the People’s Republic of China (SPC). Participants included judges from the 1st Civil Division of the Supreme People’s Court and the Second Intermediate People’s Court of Beijing as well as two German experts.
The event followed on from an online workshop held in January 2024 on the same topic, which focused on “Forms of discrimination” and “How Labor Disputes Divisions deal with violations of the prohibition of discrimination”.
Prof. Wolfgang Däubler, Professor Emeritus of German and European Labour Law, Civil Law and Commercial Law at the University of Bremen and editor of a commentary on the General Equal Treatment Act, dealt with the legal consequences of violations of the prohibition of discrimination in his lecture. The main focus was on the details of the legal claims in question, such as the standard of fault, the content of the claims and the rules on the burden of proof.
In the second thematic block, Daniel Scherr from the Federal Anti-Discrimination Agency (ADS) presented this institution. In his presentation, he went into the main tasks, the organization and the legal status of the authority as well as the procedure for advising those affected. He pointed out that the Federal Anti-Discrimination Agency has fewer powers and fewer employees than comparable institutions in other European countries.
Following the two thematic blocks, the two German experts were available to answer any unanswered questions in a discussion round, in which the Chinese judges participated with great interest. The discussion focused primarily on questions regarding the interpretation and practical application of individual provisions of the General Equal Treatment Act applicable in Germany. However, there was also a discussion on whether it would make sense to expand the competencies of the Federal Anti-Discrimination Agency. For example, there are plans to use the agency as an arbitration body to supplement the legal protection offered by the German labor courts.
As a conclusion of the event, in the interest of all participants, further workshops of this kind should be held in the future in order to achieve a more uniform jurisdiction on anti-discrimination in Chinese labor law and thus make the application of the law by the Chinese courts more efficient and predictable.