Interpretive highlights and shadows of the new contracts due to production circumstances

Abstract

With regard to the grounds for fixed-term employment, the reform approved by Royal Decree-Law 32/2021 gave rise to a contract based on production-related circumstances, emerging from the ashes of the traditional so-called “contrato eventual”. The new contract is, in reality, not one but two contracts: one for unforeseeable reasons and another for foreseeable reasons. Four years into the operation of these new contracts, from an interpretative perspective, there are more shadows than lights. This paper seeks to shed light on these grey areas, which still lack substantial case-law support. The guiding principle adopted is that of the predictability-unpredictability dichotomy, which allows us to outline the scope that the longer contract due to production circumstances should occupy on the basis of what is irregular or non cyclical, whilst the domain of the shorter contract is that of the cyclical, and is therefore closer to the sphere of the so-called “contrato fijo discontinuo” (intended for permanent but intermittent work, sometimes translated as “vertical part-time work”), although the former is more characterised by occasionality than the latter.