JSM in association with Mayer Brown has announced the recruitment of PRC lawyer Zhou Lihui. Zhou, who will be based in Hong Kong and will focus on employment matters in Mainland China, has previously worked for Jun He and Minter Ellison, building up their PRC employment teams.

JSM reports rapid growth in Chinese employment law cases since the new Chinese labour contract law was invoked in January 2008. The law encapsulates the government's extra effort to enforce mandates protecting workers' rights, not only limiting the use of temporary labourers but also stipulating strict clauses on non-terminable employees, redundancy procedures, mandatory severance pay and employment contracts.

"Obviously, the enactment of the new law is good for legal business. Before the new law was invoked, we mostly dealt with documentation and other small aspects of employment. In late 2007, there was an influx of clients asking lawyers to review their employment contracts for them before the official enactment of the new law," said Zhou.

When first invoked, the new laws were thought by some to target MNCs, which would in turn reduce employment opportunities and foreign investment. Some lawyers, however, argue it primarily targets domestic companies that have failed to comply with the previous legislation.

"I think the law failed to take into consideration the economic downturn. It does not reflect what the economy needs and it does compromise enterprises especially at this time. It works equally for both MNCs and domestic employers but the domestic firms know how to 'play the game' and the MNCs don't," said Zhou.

"The attitude of the labour law hasn't fully matured. In early 2008, there was a very strong purpose in protecting employees' interests and rights. Litigation results seemed favour employees. However, from July 2008 until now, the scales have tipped. The attitude undertaken by the courts now seems to put employers and employees on a par," she said.

 Abate expressed his confidence that employment law as a practice will continue to flourish. "Mainland China is the focus for so many MNCs each of which face issues adjusting to the introduction of new labour regulatory regime in China," he said.