Labour Justice in Brazil

The Brazilian Labour Justice was created in 1943 by ex-President Getulio Vargas.
Getúlio promulgated in 1943 a law which wold later become Consolidation of Labour Laws. At that time, Brazil was still a country predominantly rural; workers in urban areas were still unorganized, and, to foster the growth of industrial cities, Vargas (who was a dictator then) envisioned a system where urban work was overly protected; read more about labour legislation in Brazil.

The Consolidation of Labour Laws has nearly 1,000 articles; it is very difficult for employeers to comply with all obligations. So, it is no surprise that the Brazilian Labour Justice is the busiest in the world; these statistics compiled by the Superior Labour Court show that, over the past decade, more than 2,000,000 new cases are filed every year.

In the Constitution, the Labour Justice is subject of articles 111 to 117.
The Chapter on Labour Justice was amended twice in recent years. In 2004, Constitutional Amendment 45 promoted radical changes in the entire Judiciary system, and became known as the Reform of Judiciary. For the Labour Justice specifically, though, the Constitutional Amendment 24, from December 9th 1999, was more important.
Before the CA 24, the first (and main) instance for judging labour cases was the so called Board of Conciliation and Judgement (Varas de Conciliação e Julgamento). These boards were composed by three people: a togated judge, with juridical knowledge and approved into office after a public contest; one representative from the employees (usually a Union leader); and one representative from the employeers. These representatives were also called Judges (non-togated judges), with the same salary and many of the prerrogatives of the togated judges.
The representatives were not obliged to have juridical knowledge. Most of times, the representatives voted in favour of their own class.

The CA 24 abolished the figure of the non-togated judge. Currently, the Labour Justice has three instances.
First instance is the Labour Judge, who replaced the Conciliation and Judgment Board. The first competence of this Judge is still try to get the parties into an agreement. If this is not reached, the Judge issues a sentence, which may be appealed before the Regional Labour Courts.
There are currently 24 Regional Labour Courts in Brazil, each with a geographic jurisdiction.
The list below contains links to the Regional Labour Courts, and the city where the Court is located.