Montenegrin Employers Federation submits new initiative to assess constitutionality of the Sunday work ban

The Montenegrin Employers Federation  has submitted an initiative to the Constitutional Court of Montenegro to assess the constitutionality of Article 35b of the Law on Internal Trade - the provision that reintroduced a ban on working Sundays in the retail sector.

- The initiative stems from a repeatedly expressed belief that the legislator, as in 2019, violated the highest legal act. This time, however, the decision of the Constitutional Court was also ignored, as it clearly established that such a regulation banning Sunday work in retail is unconstitutional - the Employers Federation stated.

In addition to what they describe as discrimination and a restriction on the freedom of entrepreneurship without a clearly established and proven legitimate aim, the Employers Federation believes that the legislator also disregarded the Social Council and social dialogue as a constitutionally defined mechanism for articulating the interests of employees, employers, and the state (Article 65).

- Given that the Constitutional Court’s position on this issue has already been clearly expressed, and that Article 35b does not substantially differ from Article 35a, whose unconstitutionality the Court established in its decision from January this year, we expect that this time the decision will be made within a significantly shorter timeframe. This would be of particular importance for establishing a balanced and fair solution to the issue of Sunday work through social dialogue - the Employers Federation stated.