On Labor Day, bill in discussion remains upsetting

The trade union law under discussion remains upsetting to many as it has, they say, failed to “safeguard the basic fundamentals of trade unions’ rights and interests.”

Currently with the Second Standing Committee, the bill to legalize and regulate the creation of trade unions in Macau passed the legislature in January amid disapproval.

Former lawmaker Sulu Sou has lamented that on the 24th Labor Day after the establishment of the SAR, Macau still does not have a protective trade union law, “which is a dereliction of duty.”

“Legislating a trade union law is a constitutional responsibility and an international treaty responsibility that the government must fulfill,” Sou told the Times.

“Organizing trade unions, collective bargaining and strikes should be the three most important rights of workers, but the trade union law with ‘Macau characteristics’ has cut off the last two rights,” said the former pro-democracy lawmaker who was disqualified in the last Legislative Assembly elections.

Last month, the head of the Second Standing Committee, Chan Chak Mo, expressed his support to the government’s decision of not affording the right to strike in the bill, noting that the law should “reflect Macau’s characteristics.”

Lawmakers criticized the move, including Lei Chan U, who had stressed the lack of an institutionalized right to strike is “more harmful to the society’s harmony, which violates the intention of the legislation regarding trade unions.”

The government reiterated that the current law also protects the rights of workers from being harmed by participating in the labor movement. However, the lack of clear legal and procedural regulations will only lead to employers and employees not knowing how to legally start and end the labor movement, said Sou.

Lawmaker José Pereira Coutinho, who had been strongly vocal about the bill, dubbed the bill as “erroneous.”

For him, it is useless to discuss this law, as the basic fundamentals of trade union rights and interests are not safeguarded.

Also head of the Macau Civil Servants Association, Coutinho criticized the need to provide personal information of each union to the government, saying it breaches the privacy of the residents.

“If the law is published as they wanted, we had better be just a normal civil association, which have more freedom of movement, and more privacy,” Coutinho told the Times.

“This is not something that we want. Once it’s stated in the Basic Law, the government has the major responsibility to regulate. So if there is a right to strike in the Basic Law, then there is no need to regulate that in the trade union law,” he further argued.

Previously, several lawmakers representing labor interests criticized the bill for, in the words of lawmaker Che Sai Wang, “having significantly reduced the rights and guarantees that were proposed in other proposals submitted to the AL in the past and that were always voted down.”

In March, the United Nations expressed concern over a lack of legislation protecting workers from possible retaliation, adding that legislation had been passed to regulate this right, and that the law does not provide for collective bargaining nor specific protection from retribution against workers who strike.

According to the committee, workers in Macau were “not adequately covered by labor and social protection laws.”

However, the local government issued a rebuttal, saying that the Labour Relations Law also clearly bars employers from preventing employees from exercising their rights.

The government began its public consultation on the trade union law in October 2021, which was then a much-awaited move.

The government’s public consultation paper includes collective bargaining, but it was not included in the draft law that eventuated.

“The government explained that it was because ‘there is no social consensus,’ which is completely unreasonable, because it is bound to be difficult to achieve such a consensus between businessmen and laborers,” Sou decried.

Xi sends greetings to working people nationwide

President Xi Jinping yesterday extended festive greetings and best wishes to the country’s working people ahead of International Workers’ Day.

Xi, also general secretary of the Communist Party of China (CPC) Central Committee and chairman of the Central Military Commission, sent the greetings and wishes on behalf of the CPC Central Committee.

Xi called on the working people to foster an ethos of work, foster respect for model workers, and promote quality workmanship, as cited in a report issued by China Daily.

He asked them to work diligently and boldly engage in innovation to make solid progress in advancing Chinese modernization, encouraging them to play a leading role on the new journey to build China into a stronger country and realize national rejuvenation.

Xi urged Party committees and governments at all levels to protect workers’ legitimate rights and interests, earnestly help them solve their problems and difficulties, and promote a social atmosphere in which work and working people are treated with reverence and great respect.