JEDDAH; The Saudi Supreme Judicial Council has approved the establishment of seven labor courts and 96 labor chambers across main cities in the country, in a move toward empowering the labor force.

The secretary-general of the council, Salman Al-Nashwan, revealed that this is the first phase of a long-term plan. The seven courts are distributed in the main cities, namely Riyadh, Makkah, Madinah, Buraidah, Dammam, Abha, and Jeddah; while the labor chambers are spread in general courts and appellate courts across the country.

The locations of the 96 labor chambers were chosen based on statistics provided by the Labor Ministry on the number of labor disputes based on regions over the past few years. The plan comes as the country prepares to launch a labor judiciary and start its duties sometime around September 2018.

“We have made a careful selection of the judges who will be handling labor courts based on their performance evaluation, their scholarly competence, seniority, high academic qualifications in law and have conducted judicial research related to labor judiciary and relevant international regulations,” said the council.

“They have enrolled in a number of specialized training programs in the judiciary training center.”

Previously the labor disputes have been under the umbrella of Ministry of Labor and Social Development, with the new structure, labor disputes now can be resolved inside specialized labor courts under the Ministry of Justice.

Under Article 34 of the Law of Civil Procedures, labor courts are competent to hear cases related to the labor law, such as disputes concerning labor contracts, wages, rights, and work injuries and compensations; disputes concerning the employer’s imposition of disciplinary sanctions on employees; lawsuits filed for imposing labor law sanctions; and disputes arising from applying the labor law and the social insurance law.

The Justice Ministry said that it has a clear vision toward labor courts, aiming at achieving excellence, reducing the duration of the litigation, achieving integrated digital processing, and bring more assurance and attractiveness to the labor market in Saudi Arabia by upholding justice in the business sector.