Psykisk ohälsa - Vilket rehabiliteringsansvar har arbetsgivaren?

Sammanfattning: Mental illness is a problem that has grown extensively in recent years, and causes a majority of long-term sick leaves in Sweden. The purpose of this essay is to investigate how far-reaching the responsibility of the employers is for the rehabilitation efforts when an employee is suffering from mental disorder. The essay also examines the employers possibilities to dismiss a sick employee. The rehabilitation responsibilities has transformed over the years. Initially it only covered physical damage and disease, to in recent years also including factors of mental health and wellbeing. The general purpose of rehabilitation is to help employees regain their working capacity and be able to support themselves through paid work. Rehabilitation associated with mental disorder is very widespread and can be quite complicated for the employer to fullfill. The Working Environment Act (AML) and the Social Insurance Code (SFB) regulates the responsibility of the employers for the rehabilitation. However, in the legislation there is no detailed instruction on the execution of the rehabilitation process, instead this is analysed by using examples from the Swedish Labour Court. Employers must always fulfill their obligation for the rehabilitation of employees that are suffering of illness. The Swedish Employment Protection Act (LAS) deals with regulations concerning dismissal of the employees. A sick employee has a reinforced employment protection, implying that a dismissal may not take place until the rehabilitation responsibility of the employer is fulfilled. Legislation, preparatory work and law practice has been investigated and analysed to help responding the questions in this essay.