Denmark
Working environment – health and safety
Impact date: 1 July 2025 An adopted amendment allows complainants to the Danish Working Environment Authority (Arbejdstilsynet) to waive the agency’s confidentiality rule so that submitted photos, videos or other evidence may be used formally in enforcement proceedings. The complainant’s option to remain anonymous is preserved, and the consent route is unavailable for complainants under 18 years.
The Authority may disclose such material to the employer when it forms part of the legal basis for a decision, improving transparency while preserving the complainant’s right to remain anonymous.
The aim is to accelerate case handling by giving inspectors immediate, admissible evidence of serious health and safety breaches.
Employer implications/action needed N/A
The Act on the Accommodation of Employees
Impact date: 1 July 2025 The Act introduces certain minimum requirements for the accommodation employers provide to their employees. It includes provisions for the Danish Working Environment Authority’s oversight to ensure that employers comply with the requirements.
There are five basic accommodation requirements that must be met:
- There must be satisfactory access to toilets, adequate and sufficient drinking water, and proper wastewater drainage
- No more than two people may be accommodated per living room. However, this does not apply if the increase in the number of residents during the accommodation period is due to the accommodated person’s children, spouse, or cohabitant or their children. The total number of people living in the residence may also exceed two per living room if the residence’s area is 20 square meters or more per person
- Living and recreational rooms must provide satisfactory protection against humidity, cold, heat, and noise
- Living and recreational rooms must have adequate access to daylight and a proper means of ventilation through one or more openable windows directly to the outdoors
- Living and recreational rooms must have the capability for adequate heating and maintain a satisfactory indoor climate
Employer implications/action needed Employers should ensure that at least the minimum requirements for the accommodation provided to employees are met in full.
Employer risk If an employer does not meet the housing requirements, the Working Environment Authority can order the employer to rectify the conditions immediately or within a specified deadline.
Working Environment Act - Higher fines for breaches
Impact date: 1 July 2025 Parliament has raised the fine levels for violations of the Working Environment Act, with enhanced uplifts for the standard fine for material breaches and repeated infringements. Only the amount of the fine is being changed, not the scope of what is punishable. The increased fines apply to violations committed on or after 1 July 2025.
Employer implications/action needed N/A
Employer risk Employers should expect more costly outcomes if improvements lag or orders are ignored.
Act on freedom of expression for employees in the public sector
Impact date: 1 July 2025 Denmark has codified the broad free-speech rights of employees in the public sector. The Act confirms that civil servants and other public employees may speak in their private capacity about work-related matters without facing adverse employment consequences, subject to the usual limits. It consolidates scattered case-law into a single statute and applies across central, regional and local Government (and certain publicly funded bodies). Employers are expected to foster a culture that enables lawful public debate without sanctions. Guidance highlights that only narrowly defined exceptions justify restricting employees’ speech.
Employer implications/action needed Public sector employers should update policies, manager training and disciplinary templates to reflect the codified standards.
Employer risk N/A as the rules apply as a starting point to employees in all parts of the public administration.
Parental benefits - Extended reimbursement windows and longer grief leave
Impact date: 1 July 2025 Parliament has expanded eligibility for state maternity-benefit during grief leave for parents who have received long-term “lost earnings” while caring for a child at home. The grief-leave entitlement applies to periods commencing on 1 July 2025.
Employer implications/action needed N/A
Employer risk N/A
Political agreement - New collective-agreement-based business scheme for third-country labor
Impact date: Awaited - Legislative follow-up is to come after summer (political deal of 30 June 2025) On 30 June 2025, the Government announced a new “overenskomst-based” business scheme to ease recruitment from selected non-EU countries on Danish collective-agreement terms. The model ties access to being covered by a DA/FH-level collective agreement and certification with SIRI, with strengthened anti-dumping controls (e.g., ID-card measures on large sites).
Employer implications/action needed N/A
Workplace-accident reporting
Impact date: Awaited (proposal in consultation) A draft amendment proposes that employers must notify workplace accidents only if the injury causes at least three full days’ absence beyond the day of injury (currently it is one day). The change targets administrative burden by filtering out very minor injuries from mandatory notification.
Employer implications/action needed N/A
Employer risk N/A
Minimum wage
Impact date: Awaited. The Ministry of Employment's Implementation Committee’s report indicates that Denmark currently complies with the provisions of the Directive. However, certain formal requirements entail that the Ministry of Employment will, moving forward, have to submit a range of data and information to the EU Commission every two years, including details on collective agreement coverage and the lowest wage/salary rates. The Implementation Committee has assumed that the Directive remains valid unless the European Court of Justice determines otherwise in connection with the pending annulment action.
As an important step in the annulment proceedings, an opinion has been issued by the Advocate General of the Court of Justice of the European Union, proposing that the directive be annulled in its entirety because it is incompatible with the EU Treaty basis. The Advocate General’s Opinion is not binding on the CJEU. The question of whether the directive is incompatible with the EU’s Treaty-based competence to adopt directives regarding labor market issues, and should therefore be annulled, will not be finally settled until the CJEU makes its ruling in the case. The EU Directive on adequate minimum wages in the EU is now in force and Member States had until 15 November 2024 to implement it. The Danish Government has taken legal action against the European Parliament to have the Directive or parts of it annulled. This is due to the Government considering the requirements of the Directive to be inconsistent with the Danish labor model in which employment terms, such as wages, are to be negotiated between employers and employees and their organizations regarding collective agreements.
Employer implications/action needed No action required at this time, but employers should monitor the progress of the legal action taken by the Danish Government.
Employer risk N/A
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