Labour norms set to get a makeover

The government is planning to integrate three labour laws into a single code, which among others might make it tougher to set up worker unions while the companies would not need any official sanction before taking any termination action if their staff strength is up to 300.
The government officials, however, said the proposed moves are aimed at improving ease of doing business and are not necessarily 'anti-workers'.
According to one of the proposals, registering a trade union will require at least 10 per cent of the employees or 100 workers, in contrast to the current requirement of seven members, regardless of the size of the establishment.

Besides, only employees will be permitted to form unions, and in the unorganised sector, two outside officials can become members of a union.
These are part of the draft Labour Code on Industrial Relations Bill, 2015, prepared by the Labour Ministry, while proposing to combine Industrial Disputes Act, 1947, the Trade Unions Act, 1926, and the Industrial Employment (Standing Orders) Act, 1946.
The government will meet union and industry representatives on May 6 to discuss proposals of the draft of the Labour Code, a senior Labour Ministry official said.

Reacting to media reports that it is "anti-workers", the official said: "It's a misconception that this Bill is anti-workers as we have proposed to increase compensation for workers in certain cases of a job loss to 45 days' pay, from the existing provision of 15 days."

On the government's attempt to make hiring flexible, the ministry official said: "Unions should be true representatives of the workers. Besides, the law should be in tune with the recent times."
He added, "The existing law has undoubtedly encouraged registration of trade unions. But there are cases where there are more than one trade union in one industrial unit, employing not even 50 workers. Thus, this large number of unions is serving no purpose there.