Court supports job seekers' right to honesty

By MIRIAM BULWAR DAVID-HAY (TRANSLATED)
If you have lost your job and been sent by your local Employment Bureau to work at a job you don't want, take heart - the Tel Aviv Labor Court has ruled in favor of a man who was placed in that position, reports www.mynet.co.il. The court ruled that a worker should not have to hide his true ambitions from a potential employer, and that if an employer then decided he was unsuitable, the bureau should not withhold his unemployment benefits. According to the report, the case arose after the bureau sent a 28-year-old Tel Aviv man for an interview for work in a warehouse. At the interview, the man was asked what his ambitions were, and he replied that he wanted to be a salesman. His potential employer reportedly became angry and wrote to the Employment Bureau complaining that he was not looking for a salesman and did not want the man. The bureau then stopped the man's unemployment benefits, saying that he had "created conditions for not being accepted to work" and had caused the failure of his job opportunity. The report said the man then appealed to the Tel Aviv Labor Court, which ruled in his favor. "A worker's honest answer as to his future plans should not stand against him as a stumbling block," the court said. "If an employer refuses to hire him because he is not interested in temporary work, it is the employer who is rejecting the worker who was sent to him." No response was reported from the Employment Service.