Ministry comes up with fresh Labour Act draft

KATHMANDU, MAR 05 -

The Ministry of Labour and Employment (MoLE) has come up with a fresh draft of the Labour Act, bypassing all the points agreed between employers’ organisations and trade unions in the previous draft.

Employers and trade unions have expressed reservations over the new draft, saying it has failed to ensure benefits for both sides.

Employers said the draft left out some crucial points such as labour flexibility, industrial peace declaration for the next four years, hire-and-fire and no-work-no-pay provisions which had been agreed with the trade unions. They also blamed that the government ‘intentionally’ omitted all the agreed beneficial provisions.

“Minimisation of labour disputes and balancing the issues of labour flexibility and social security were the guiding factors of the earlier draft,” said Pashupati Murarka, vice-president of the Federation of Nepalese Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FNCCI). “But nothing as such has been included in the new draft.”

Trade unionists said as the provisions in the new draft refuse to go along with workers’ welfare, they would not accept it. Achoot Pandey, general secretary of Nepal Trade Union Congress (NTUC), said the new draft has missed important points like the inclusion of the informal sector workers in the Labour Act. The provision of labour force without any labour law in special economic zones is condemnable, he said, adding, “Moreover, the draft also denies offering social security package which was meant for the welfare of the workers,” he said.

Earlier, the then Ministry of Labour and Transport Mangement had prepared a draft with technical assistance from the International Labour Organization. The ministry had formed a national taskforce with representatives from the government, trade unions and employers to devise the draft.

The draft had also been amended three times before it was approved by line ministries, including law, finance and industry ministries, and stakeholders like the private sector and trade unions. The previous draft was all set to be forwarded to the now-defunct Parliament, but the dissolution of the Constituent Assembly (CA) prevented the ministry from doing so.

“All of a sudden, the ministry has now come up with a new draft without holding consultations with us,” said Murarka, who is also the chairman of FANCCI’s Employers’ Council. The ministry forwarded the new draft to the private sector, trade unions and other stakeholders a couple of weeks ago. The previous draft had made it mandatory for employers to enrol every staff in social security schemes, against which trade unions had agreed for stern provisions like hire-and-fire and no-work-no-pay provisions.

“If the new draft Act is approved, it will harm the industrial labour relations,” said Manish Agrawal, vice chairman of FNCCI’s Employment’s Council. He said the new draft will make no contribution in bringing reforms in industrial labour relation and industrial environment.

FNCCI officials on Monday submitted a memorandum to the Labour and Employment Secretary Suresh Man Shrestha, demanding inclusion of provisions agreed in the previous draft. Ministry Spokesperson Buddhi Bahadur Khadka said as the previous draft was fully prepared by the ILO, it could not fully reflect domestic concerns, adding, “So, the ministry prepared the new draft.”

According to him, the ministry will change the points as per the suggestions from the employers and trade unions and try to make it able to build better employer-worker relation.

Source: The Kathmandu Post