Belgium
Littler in Belgium
With offices in Brussels, Mechelen, Ghent and Hasselt, we counsel employers on a wide range of labor and employment matters, including the defense of claims, collective bargaining and advice on Works Council matters, representation before government agencies, audits and training.
What We Do
We are the day-to-day partner with management, HR and legal departments when it comes to every aspect of labor and employment law, including GDPR. We have a very experienced litigation practice, and many of the lawsuits we handle relate to unfair dismissal, discrimination, harassment, compensation in lieu of notice, employees protected against dismissal, strikes, restrictive covenants and bonus and equity plans. Our litigation practice also includes defending our clients and members of management in employment-related criminal proceedings. Having both Dutch- and French-speaking specialists and offices in Flanders and Brussels, we comfortably cover the entire Belgian territory, both in terms of presence and litigation capacity.
We have extensive experience advising our clients on mergers and acquisitions. Our team’s background at major international law firms includes the HR aspects of both national and cross-border corporate transactions and restructurings. We perform due diligence processes and advise our clients on relevant HR and employment law-related issues. We identify potential noncompliance risks, and also translate these into the relevant transactional documents and recommend suitable solutions to remedy the identified issues pre- or post-closing where appropriate.
We often advise on how to best structure international employment relationships, from contractual (including applicable law), social security and tax perspectives. We also have extensive experience in other immigration matters, such as application for visa and work permits.
We regularly assist clients with planning and executing mass layoffs and reorganizations in general, within or outside the context of corporate transactions. We often are involved directly in discussions and negotiations with the workforce, employee representative bodies (such as works councils) and external unions.
Our team has extensive experience in the field of unfair dismissal and discrimination cases. Ours was the first Belgian law firm to conduct a full analysis of case law on unfair dismissal and is renowned for its experience in this area of law. Our conclusions have received press coverage and have been the subject of various seminars and articles.
Our team regularly assists clients with questions related to privacy at work. We help our clients comply with privacy rules, including the EU’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR).
