Regulatory framework of strike and its problem in Latvia

International legal provisions provide for human rights and freedoms, and the freedom of expression and the right to work belong to these. Considering that during any employment relationship disputes can arise between the involved parties, international legal provisions state that a strike as the final means for the settlement of a dispute can be used. Paragraph 108 of the Satversme (the Constitution of Latvia) provides that in Latvia, employed people have the right to strike. Systematically, the provisions of the Constitution are being regulated by the Labour Dispute Law and the Strike Law. It might seem that in Latvia, any employed person has been entitled to the right to strike as provided by the Satversme. However, the strike of general practitioners in summer 2017 highlighted the problem of executing strikes. Firstly, at the time being, the right to strike can only be associated with one form of employment, i.e., employment relationship. As only a part of general practitioners is employed on the basis of an employment agreement, the strike regulatory framework that is in force in Latvia can be used only by a part of general practitioners employed under an employment agreement in order to protect their collective interests. Secondly, the Labour Dispute Law provides for that a strike as the final means can be used exclusively for the protection of collective interests (within the framework of concluding a collective agreement), but not within the framework of a contract governed by public law. The strike by general practitioners showed that Latvia has complied only partially with international legal provisions because a strike can only be used by people employed under employment agreements and only in disagreements regarding a Collective agreement. In order to resolve this problem so that any employed person is entitled to the right to strike in the future, it is necessary to amend the Labour Dispute Law by expanding the range of labour dispute subjects. The aim: to analyse international and Latvia's regulatory framework for the right of employed people to strike and recommend necessary amendments to laws to solve detected problems. Materials used: international legal provisions and Latvian legal acts, publications and literature. Methods used in this article: descriptive, analysis, synthesis, dogmatic, induction and deduction as well as legal interpretation methods – grammatical, systemic, historical and teleological.publishersversionPeer reviewe

Staff access control at airports

Since 2001 the aviation industry is continuously facing a growing problem of safety and security within air travel procedure. The restrictions had been taken seriously, new rules and technologies surfaced. Passengers are often defined as wrongdoers but the airport staff has much better conditions to do any kind of attack or pilferage. To avoid any possibility of attack the airport´s staff have to be controlled and monitored. With the combination of video camera, Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) tag and biometrical identification it is solvable

Legal consequences and problems of the servitudes of right of way established by administrative acts in Latvia

The right to own a property is guaranteed by the Article 105 of the Constitution of the Republic of Latvia that in the same time stipulates that the said rights may be restricted only in accordance with law. This legitimate property right restriction is determined in Article 928 of the Civil Law: the ownership may be restricted both by private intent and by law. One of the restrictions of ownership rights is the servitude of right of way which is established by law, a contract, a court judgement, or a will. During the land reform, the State Forest Service, land commissions, and municipalities had the legal basis to establish the servitude of right of way also by an administrative act, taking a corresponding decision. However, many decisions were insufficient and legally incorrect. As a result, today the servitudes of right of way established by the administrative acts during the period of the land reform do not fulfil their purpose and cause a number of legal and practical problems both to owners of immovable property and to state institutions. In order to explore these problems, referring to the Article 7 of the Paragraph 105 of the protocol resolution No.56 of the Cabinet of Ministers from 29 October 2013, the Ministry of Environmental Protection and Regional Development in cooperation with the Ministry of Transport, the Ministry of Justice, and the Ministry of Agriculture issued the Conceptual Report “On the Problems Occurring in Relation with the Servitudes of Right of Way Established during the Land Reform and Their Possible Solutions” (hereinafter – the Conceptual Report). In general there are 2 possible solutions, but for the second solution there are five courses of action, one of which – in cases when there is a road on private property that is needed for public use it is to be determined as an encumbrance of the immovable property “Public road”. The aim of the research is by analysis of the problems of the servitudes of right of way, established by the administrative acts during the period of the land reform, to evaluate whether the solutions offered in the Conceptual Report are practically applicable and will give the desired result, as well as to offer the author’s vision for solution of the existing problems. The author has used the scientific research approaches – descriptive, analytical, inductive and deductive, logical-constructive, formal-dogmatic, graphical and interpretation of legal norms – grammatical, systemic, and teleological.publishersversionPeer reviewe

Review on the consumers' response to the Covid-19 crisis in Latvia

The regulations for restricting the Covid-19 virus set by the Latvian government, which entered into force on March 13, 2020, caused significant changes in the operation of outlets and consumer behavior. At the onset of the emergency, Latvia, like many parts of the world, experienced uncoordinated collective behavior that could potentially lead to significant changes in food supply chains. Therefore, one of the research directions of The National Research Program project “Towards the Post-pandemic Recovery: Economic, Political and Legal Framework for the Preservation of Latvia's Growth Potential and Increasing Competitiveness” (recovery-LV) (2020) was to find out how the Covid-19 crisis Restrictions have changed buyers' habits towards buying and consuming food. The article summarizes and analyses the research results of the content analysis, semi-structured interviews and survey conducted within the project. An analysis of the results shows that, as a result of the crisis, consumers are less likely to visit outlets, cook more often at home and choose more locally sourced food. It was concluded that the consumer agitation regarding the purchase of food products in 2020 was short-lived, which later returned to the usual limits of the habits of various socio-demographic groups of the population.publishersversionPeer reviewe

Prevalence of bullying and harassment in youth sport: The case of different types of sport and participant role

Purpose: Studies on participation of various social groups in sports reveal not only positive but also negative impact of this activity on the person’s health, well-being and future. A particularly serious social problem in sport is the aggressive behaviour of all participants, which can also manifest itself as bullying and cause a number of negative consequences. The aim of the research is to identify the prevalence of bullying and harassment in organized sport in the case of individual, combat, team sports and participant roles. Methodology. A supplemented version of Bullying and harassment in sport questionnaire (BHISQ) was used to conduct the survey. The survey involved 1440 participants of organized sport. Findings: Almost one third of research participants in the team sports identified themselves as victims, which is significantly more than the sum of the results of two remaining groups. Comparing the percentages of victims’ and bystanders’ confessions, it has been found that bullying in individual sports can be significantly more active; i.e., the number of athletes who have seen bullying is significantly higher than the number of athletes who have named themselves as victims. The highest manifestation of bullying unfolds in team sports, where most – almost one fifth – of respondents attributed the role of the bully against their team member(s) to themselves, while the percentages of bullies against opponents in combat and team sports are similar. In combat and team sports, unlike in the individual sports, the roles of bullies against opponents, unfolding in bullying actions, are more frequently expressed.This project has received funding from European Social Fund (project No 09.3.3-LMT-K-712-01-0190) under grant agreement with the Research Council of Lithuania (LMTLT)

Social and economic challenges and opportunities in family formation in Latvia

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Prerequisites for promoting innovation projects in the agricultural sector

According to the European Innovation Partnership for Agricultural productivity and Sustainability (EIP-AGRI) that started 2012, the Europe 2020 Flagship Initiative "Innovation Union" specifies European Innovation Partnerships (EIP) as a new tool for speeding up innovation through linking existing policies and instruments. Based on the report “Innovation, Agricultural Productivity and Sustainability in Latvia” prepared by the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) in 2019, it analyses innovations in agriculture in order to promote further development of the sector. The agricultural sector has progressed more slowly than the economic sector and slightly more needs to be invested in order to ensure a well-functioning innovation system and a policy environment that would increase agricultural productivity and improve sustainability. The aim of paper is to reveal what prerequisites are necessary to promote the development of innovation projects in agricultural sector. The research based on analysis of documents exploring the views of European Innovation Partnership project managers on how the innovation process in European Innovation Partnership projects has taken place and what are the main preconditions for promoting the development of innovation projects, as well as observation and semistructured interview, in turn, exploring, which can contribute to the development of innovation projects. As a result of the research, 8 preconditions for the promoting development of innovation projects in agriculture were identified. The results of the research can have a significant impact on the development of innovation, identifying weaknesses, problems that need more attention and take specific activities to improve the current situation.publishersversionPeer reviewe