15-03-2019

Establishment of business canteens: Regulation repealed

The TS establishes that the regulation of the workplace of 1938 is understood to be repealed, so that if there is no collective regulation, as in the case prosecuted, there is no rule that obliges the employer to set up a company canteen. A private vote is issued.

A part of the workers of the company, who have a split day with a flexible schedule and a maximum time to eat for two hours, request the company to proceed to establish a dining room in the workplace in the terms established in D 8 -6-1938 and in the OM 30-6-1938, regulators of work dining rooms.

The question that is being debated is to determine if the regulations on the establishment of company canteens in the workplace are or are not in force.

Until now, the doctrine of the TS understood that this regulation was in force, since it did not violate the constitutional principles and neither had it been expressly or tacitly repealed, nor replaced by possible development regulations or by collective bargaining.

The Chamber, rectifying its doctrine, declares that the regulations on work dining rooms of the year 1938 are not in force. Considers that this regulation was incorporated into the RGSHT of 1940, which was repealed by the OGSHT (O 16-3-1971), and that, in turn, has been repealed by RD 486/1997, which is the legislation currently in force for these effects and that does not impose to the companies the obligation to install dining rooms in their work centers in the terms of the Decree and the Order of 1938.

Therefore, there is no rule in force, of a legal or conventional nature, from which it could be inferred that the employer is obliged in the present case to install a company canteen in a work center with the characteristics established in the regulations of 1938

Consequently, in the absence of a legal or conventional obligation to establish it, the TS understands that it is a conflict of interest, and that it is a matter that, in the absence of standards, is a skillful and adequate ground for collective bargaining, adequate to agree on measures that satisfy the interests of both parties.

A private vote is issued by three magistrates, who consider that the regulations on canteens are not repealed since the regulations cited as derogatory refer to the area of occupational risk prevention that does not regulate the business obligation to enable premises for canteens, but the conditions of the dining rooms that may exist in the company.