To harmonize the EU Directive no. 1158 /2019 with the Romanian legislation, in the Official Gazette no. 431 of 3 May 2022 was published the Government Emergency Ordinance no. 57/2022 for the completion and amendment of Law no. 202/2002 on equal opportunities and treatment between women and men and the amendment of Article 3 paragraph (2 ^ 1) of the Emergency Ordinance Government no. 121/2021 on the establishment of measures at the level of central public administration and for amending and supplementing certain normative acts. 

This normative act brings legislative additions to the balance between the professional and private life of parents and caregivers and defines new terms: 

• “Caregiver’s leave” means leave for workers to provide personal care or support to a relative or person living in the same household as the worker and in need of significant care or support as a result of a severe medical problem, as defined by each member state; 

• The term “flexible working arrangements” means workers can adapt their working hours, including remote work formulas, flexible working schedules, or short-time work schedules. 

By this act, it is also established that the employer will not be allowed to order the dismissal of the employee during the period in which: 

– the employee is on caregiver’s leave; 

– the employee exercised the right to request flexible working arrangements. 

Any less favorable treatment of a woman or a man because of application for or took a childcare leave, parental leave, a caregiver leave, or that she/he exercised her right to request flexible working arrangements constitutes discrimination within the meaning of Law no. 202/2022. 

Until the adoption of these new regulations, granting a flexible working schedule for the employee was a unilateral decision of the employers. However, from now on, employers will be obliged to consider all requests for flexible working arrangements and to document any refusal to grant them.