SK adopts workplace anti-bullying law
ANEW law aimed at preventing harassment in the workplace took effect in South Korea on Tuesday, bringing the widespread but overlooked issue of bullying at work into the legal domain.
A revised law on labour standards, commonly called the workplace anti-bullying law, went into effect after a six-month grace period.
Under the new law, workplace harassment is defined as an act of incurring physica l or mental suffering or a worsening of the work env ironment by employers or workers using their status or power to behave beyond the scope of working norms.
If workplace harassment is reported, employers should immediately investigate it and take proper action, such as preventing victims from working with perpetrators in the same place.
If reta liator y or discriminator y measures are ta ken against v ictims or those who report abusive conduct, employers could face a maximum three-year jail term and a fine of up to 30 million won ($25,423). But t he law does not stipulate t he punishment for a perpetrator.
A separate law, which a lso went into ef fect on Tuesday, says t hat stress from workplace bully ing is subject to t he rules on industria l accidents and compensation.
The anti-bully ing law is expected to help root out workplace “gapjil,” a newly coined word referring to abusive conduct by people in positions of power toward those under t heir influence.
“In t he past, there was l it t le awareness that sexual abuse was a wrongful act, but these days, people think there should be no sexual harassment. We expect workplace bully ing will gradually be resolved with the implementation of t he law,” an of ficia l at t he labour ministr y said.
Seven contract-based announcers at public broadcaster MBC filed a complaint with the labour ministr y against the company on Tuesday, claiming that MBC v iolated t he workplace anti-bully ing law.
The announcers who joined MBC in 2016-2017 were ordered to leave the company in 2018, which was later judged by labour administrative panels as an unfair dismissal.
A court approved an injunction that they had filed to be granted the temporary status of workers, but the company has blocked them from doing related jobs.
They became the first employees to ask the government to look into t he case since t he law’s implementation.
Experts said it may take time for the law to settle in as there is some ambiguity in judging which cases fall into the category of workplace bullying.
In February, the government released a guideline that contains examples of workplace harassment to ease confusion for companies.
Most conglomerates have offered education to their employees or rev ised their rules on employment or discipline to brace for t he law’s implementation.
But about 20 per cent of smaller firms said they have yet to set up detailed plans to tack le abusive conduct in the workplace, according to a recent sur vey by the Korea Chamber of Commerce and Industr y, a major business lobby group.