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Repeal of provisions relating to COVID-19 vaccination under the Employment Ordinance

17 April 2023. Published by Andrea Randall, Partner and Lillian Wong, Associate

The Labour Department announced on 12 April 2023 that the provisions under the Employment Ordinance ("EO") relating to a legitimate COVID-19 vaccination request (the "Vaccination Provisions") will be repealed with effect on 16 June 2023, one year after they first came into effect on 17 June 2022.

The Vaccination Provisions were introduced last year as part of the Government's anti-epidemic measures.  One of the Vaccination Provisions included that an employer could legally dismiss an employee due to non-compliance with a legitimate COVID-19 vaccination request made by the employer.

With the removal of the statutory Vaccine Pass requirement earlier this year and having consulted the Health Bureau and the Department of Health, the Government will repeal the provisions under the EO relating to a legitimate COVID-19 vaccination request on 16 June 2023.  This means that legitimate vacation requests made prior to 16 June 2023 will cease to have effect from that date onwards and non-compliance with the vaccination requests will no longer be a lawful reason to dismiss an employee.

Our team at RPC are widely recognized as leading employment lawyers in Hong Kong. We are of the few specialist employment law practices in Hong Kong and we act for both employers and employees on contentious and non-contentious matters.

Please do not hesitate to contact our Partner and Head of the Employment Practice in Hong Kong, Andrea Randall (andrea.randall@rpc.com.hk / +852 2216 7208) for any queries regarding the issues raised in this article or any employment law related queries you may have. 

All material contained in this article is provided for general information purposes only and should not be construed as legal, accounting, financial or tax advice, or as opinion to any person or specific case. RPC accepts no responsibility for any loss or damage arising directly or indirectly from action taken, or not taken, which may arise from reliance on information contained in this article. You are urged to seek legal advice concerning your own situation and any specific legal question that you may have.