What are working and advisory bodies?

To support its activities, the government establishes its working and advisory bodies in which members of the government and other experts are involved. The government may entitle a person, who is not a member of the goverment – government representative, to perform specific activities for for its needs.

Working and advisory bodies can be established as permanent or temporary organs according to issues that they deal with. Working and advisory bodies are divided into councils of the government, commissions and committees. They differ in their scope and focus. Their activities are usually focused on preparation of strategies and materials of nationwide consequences, monitoring of trends in the respective areas, preparation of bases for decisions of the government or making comments to the international documents from the point of view of the respective scope of activities.

Advisory bodies are established most frequently on the basis of government resolutions, laws or government regulations. The activities of all advisory bodies are governed by their statutes, rules of order, and possibly other binding documents depending on the character of an advisory body. These documents must have a standardised form and are approved by a government resolution. The operation of committees, commissions and councils is provided by the Office of the Government of the Czech Republic or the relevant ministries.

Pursuant to the government resolution no. 175/2002 (only in czech), chairpersons of individual working and advisory bodies have a duty to inform on their activities members of the government through annual reports. These reports are presented by the end of May of the next year; each report contains obligatory part that is defined in a binding scheme.

Specific role among working and advisory bodies has an organ which was constituted as a institutionalized platform for the social dialogue between the government, trade unions and employers. It is the Council for Economic and Social Agreement, so called Tripartite. This council is a common voluntary, bargaining and initiative organ of the goverment, trade unions and employers focused on reaching agreements on principle issues of the economic and social development. Its activities are primarily aimed at the isses as follows: economic policy of the state, employment relations, colllective bargaining and employment, social issues, salaries and wages, public services and public administration, industrial safety, human resources development and, last but not least, position of the Czech Republic in the EU.

List of currently active working and advisory bodies and other relating information you can find at website www.vlada.cz.