Autor: Martin Doubrava, Datum: 20. 4. 2020
COVID -19 and Crisis Act
Since 12 March 2020, in the Czech Republic, the state of emergency in connection with COVID-19 has been in force. and legal measures have never been applied to consider whether the losses or losses incurred in doing business could be lower and whether the state proceeded correctly in limiting business and in the field of business, the new regulation could not be changed in any other way. It is striking for example in comparison with abroad.
The state initially followed the so-called Crisis Act, whose §36, paragraph 41 explicitly stipulates that the state is liable for damage caused to legal or natural persons in causal connection with emergency measures under the Crisis Act.
According to that legislation, it thus establishes the State's liability for damage, whatever the cause of the damage. Legally, according to this Act, even if the state's measures are correct, morally unconditionally accepted, the state is liable for damage if it decides to proceed in accordance with this crisis law.
In principle, it is sufficient for claiming damage to the State that the crisis measures have been implemented, the damage has been caused to the entrepreneur or the company and that there is a causal link between the crisis measure and the damage incurred. In legal terms, the damage for which the state is responsible is not limited and is fully compensated. Business entities will then be exposed only to the need to prove that they have tried to mitigate the damage by preventing it.
I emphasize the fact that the Czech state is responsible for damages incurred by business entities by declaring crisis measures, i.e. not for the emergence of the COVID -19 epidemic, but for the established crisis measures according to the Crisis Act.
The Czech state obviously subsequently realized this and used different legal regulations limiting the state's responsibility to prolong crisis measures.
This does not change the fact that entrepreneurs, respectively, and members of corporate statutory bodies should eliminate any damage incurred while administering foreign assets and at the same time claim damages no later than 6 months from the date on which they learned of the damage.
It will seem somewhat chaotic to determine the addressee of such a claim, which may be either the Ministry of the Interior or the Health Service or the government, and this issue must be left to the law firm for accurate evaluation.
