No doubt that the labour market is anxiously waiting for the new law of entry, exit and residency to be enforced in December 2016. All are waiting with different feelings, anxiety and concepts. Employers have a careful feelings, while the workers have optimistic hopes.
The society is waiting for the implementation of the law to be passage towards labour market stability. Consequently, the ambiguity that shaped this issue will be cleared, especially for some articles along clarification to the role of the Ministry of Labour to release new work forms that enable them control the labour market and organise the mutual relationships between employers and employees.
This absolutely will create an environment that allows the smooth flow of work and on the other hand, it will prevent the existence of fake companies and puts an end to visas merchants. The goal of passing such law is to prevent the violations and abuse of law which badly affect the market and denigrate the labour market reputation in Qatar.
No question about the real intention of the state and all its organisations to avoid the gaps, amend and update the rules and conditions of work relationships. This is clearly noticed in applying the regulations in reality and watching the results.
Additionally, the way it follows to rectify the defects and support the success that is gradually achieved, is remarkable. In order to prove the aforementioned steps, the concerned authorities updated wages control system that enables all related organisations to be involved in a way that leads to the best improvement in labour market. Also, the new wage system facilitates supervision of companies’ compliance to the law and assures their committed to their obligations towards their employees.
It’s worth mentioning that the new amended forthcoming law does not include substantial differences with current law, but included amendment of some important articles that misused by employers.
One of these articles is about the transfer of sponsorship carries the better way to organise the transfer of sponsorship which used to include some conditions in favour of the employer. Transfer was not possible without approval of employer. The amended article has made it clear and simple to the workers to change work even without approval of their employers, if they meet some requirement like duration of contract.
Thus hereby I am going to give general overview on the new law and try to explain the most important regulations within the contexts and articles of law that published in the official newspaper of the state.
The new residency law is an obviously reflection of the awareness of the Qatari legislator for the defects and the negative aspects found in the current law, which represents a source of conflict and argument between the related parties.
It is important to mention that the new law reveals a real willingness and honest desire in reorganising the labour market and put it in the right track which will assist in the development of the society. In addition, it helps in separating the relationship between sponsorship and work, and also in preventing the dominations of one law over another, and insuring the parallel executions of the laws of the same degree.
Comparing the new law with the current one, of course the most important article comes to the surface is that organises the transfer of the sponsorship. The article states that the concerned authority in the Ministry of Interior has the right to execute the transfer of sponsorship for the labour up on a written agreement between the new employer and the current employers in addition to approval from the Ministry of Administrative Development, Labour and Social Affairs.
This is applicable to workers under the labour law. Implementing of the law in such way results in transfer of the sponsorship to a new employer and clearing all commitments of the previous employer. The current implementation under “No Objection Letter” which acts as a written agreement between current and new employers.
Another significance suggests itself on the new law: which makes a new scenario for changing the employer. The article states the right for the employee to change his employer before reaching the end of his contract provided that he obtains an approval from his current employer and the authorisations from the Ministry of Labour and Ministry of Social Service Affairs. It seems that there is no difference while comparing to the current article, and, however, to continue reviewing this article, we found that the employee has the right to change the employer in two ways; either upon completion of his contract term or after five years of service for the unlimited contracts.
The aforementioned context should catch our interests because it breaks up the autocracy of the law of sponsorship, and also we can assume that the article gives a resurrection to employment contract which is regarded one of the basics for the new law. To have more illustrations, we can read the following context; “the expatriate has the right to change his employer upon reaching the end of his contract term”.
It worth mentioning that “sponsor terminology” is no longer existing in the new law and replaced by “recruiter”. Accordingly, the issue of transfer of the sponsorship term is replaced by the issue of changing the employer, and consequently, all is requested to be aware of this new term and amend the concept, especially in categorising the priorities of work’s parties.
Now and according to the new law, the employer is responsible for the residency for his employees and the relations between the employers and employees are controlled by terms of the employment contract; when the employment begins and ends. This contract has a specific period and the employment will be effective from the recruitment date, and as per the following wording of the article “The employee has the right to change the employer at the end of his contract term or after five years for unlimited contracts.”
It is important to mention that this article set up the regulations and rules for the labour to change the employer in identical way that matches the variety of the employment contract in the Qatari Labour Law. It is emphasising once again on the recruitment of expatriate, work and termination will be ruled by the employment contract. The contract as per the labour law is classified into two categories; the limited one which begins and end in certain dates and it can be renewed according to the mutual agreement between both parties.
As a result, the employer can not dominate the employee and prevents him to work for another employer as well. The job will play the major role in the market and it will act as a product or service, and hence the market in this case will be subject to (supply and demand) policy where the job represents the supply and the man power represent the demand, and the wages will be categorised according to this policy.
Referring to unlimited contracts, the new labour law and residency law have put a term of five years as a maximum period and as per the articles of the law that specify the term starts at the beginning of the employment for the employer and ends upon completion of five years and hence the employee is considered passed the legal period of the contract and consequently, he will be eligible to move to work for another employer.
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