On 24 July, the President of the Supreme Court, Aigars Strupišs, met with the Director General of the Employers' Confederation of Latvia, Kaspars Gorkšs, and social security and healthcare expert Pēteris Leiškalns to discuss issues related to the issuance and control of sick-leave certificates.

During the meeting, the need to urgently introduce a functioning and effective monitoring mechanism for assessing the validity of sick-leave certificates, as well as to introduce their classification according to diagnosis, was highlighted. Aigars Strupišs emphasized that sick-leave certificates are currently one of the most common reasons for postponing or cancelling court hearings – they are among the three most common hindrances. In his opinion, two measures should be taken to improve the situation, namely an effective control mechanism to verify the validity of sick-leave certificates, as well as a classification of sick-leave certificates with a special note indicating that a specific health problem prevents participation in a court hearing. The postponement of court hearings not only causes huge material losses to the state by running the law enforcement system at idle, but also undermines people's trust in the state and the rule of law.

Representatives of the Employers' Confederation reported that the number of sick-leave certificates in Latvia continues to grow, and the costs incurred as a result amount to approximately EUR 360 million per year. The experience of other Baltic countries in the regulatory framework for issuing sick-leave certificates and in monitoring issues was also presented.

The meeting participants noted that currently available statistics and practical observations allow us to hypothesize that there is a high probability of deliberate misuse of sick-leave certificates, not only to delay court proceedings, but also in employment relationship.

The parties agreed that the discussion will continue in September in meetings with the Ministries of Health, Justice and Welfare. Until then, the Employers' Confederation will compile information on the practice of issuing and monitoring sick-leave certificates in Estonia and Lithuania.

 

Baiba Kataja, Communication Specialist of the Supreme Court

Telephone: +371 67020396; e-mail: baiba.kataja@at.gov.lv