Cabinet decision to amend labour laws unfortunate:Trade Unions

Central Trade Unions today termed the recent Cabinet decision to amend three crucial labour laws including the Factories Act as "unfortunate", saying they were not consulted during the entire process.
Condemning the "unilateral approach" of the government in giving nod to the amendments, they also opposed some of the provisions of the three laws which were amended by the Cabinet on July 30.
The Central Trade Unions are likely to meet soon to decide action programme against such "hasty employer friendly amendments" in the name of development, they said.
"The AITUC Secretariat has opposed some of the provisions of labour law amendments as approved by the Union Cabinet on July 30. It is unfortunate that the Central Trade Unions were not consulted while approving amendments in the Factories Act, Apprenticeship Act and Labour Laws relating to small and medium enterprises," AITUC said in a statement here.

The Union Cabinet had approved proposals to amend three labour laws including the key Factories Act 1948, Apprentices Act 1961 and Labour Laws (exemption from furnishing returns and maintaining registers by certain establishments) Act,1988.
AITUC said it had opposed amendment in the Factories Act allowing women to work in night shifts and increase in overtime hours from 50 to 100.

"While AITUC is not opposed to simplification process per se in maintaining registers and sending returns for each Act for small and medium enterprises, it opposes increasing the ambit of such industries from 10 to 40 workers.
"The Central Trade Unions are likely to meet soon to decide action programme against such hasty employer friendly amendments in the name of development," it said.

The CITU said a "unilateral approach" has been taken up by the government and added the reported amendments were not in their knowledge and they only came to know about these through the newspapers.
"Some amendments the trade unions were demanding but we do not know what the government has finally done. This unilateral approach is condemnable," CITU president A K Padmanavan said.