Pereira Coutinho against current provisions of Trade Union bill

The lawmaker and president of the Board of Directors of the Macao Public Servants Association (ATFPM), José Pereira Coutinho has expressed his disagreement with some important provisions of the bill that aims to establish a Trade Union Law in Macau.

Questioned by the media on the topic on the sidelines of the Legislative Assembly (AL) Media Spring Luncheon, the lawmaker said he was opposed to this bill, adding that it was preferable to have no Trade Union Law.

“I prefer not to have a Trade Union Law than to have a law that constrains even further the fundamental rights of the workers. I do not accept certain aspects such as the idea that the DSAL (Labour Affairs Bureau) inspectors could enter (in my case) ATFPM and scrutinize all the private files and papers from our members,” he said, adding, “I prefer not to have this law and keep what we have now that is the freedom of association and of expression that we still have in Macau.”

Pereira Coutinho noted that according to the provisions of the bill now at the AL waiting for further discussion,P DSAL’s Inspectors will have the legal right to inspect and collect information from all the formally established labor union groups to investigate, “How many members we have, from which nationalities, where they work and their job posts, etc.” he remarked.

“This is very dangerous and it is not what we wanted or wished for. If this system moves forward as was proposed, for sure the ATFPM will not change [its current status as an association] to become a labor union,” he concluded.

Still, the lawmaker said he hopes that the government side will promote amendments to the current bill so some of these major clashing points can be corrected in time.

At the same event, lawmaker Ella Lei, linked with the Macau Federation of Trade Unions (FAOM) also aired similar concerns regarding the current provisions of the Trade Union bill related to the operation of the labor union groups and their responsibilities, namely of reporting to the government certain aspects of the operations as well as members.

Lei said that people are concerned with some of these provisions as well as the penalties the groups can incur if they fail to report. She proposed that further discussion on the chapters addressing these topics directly is needed before the bill is approved.

Pereira Coutinho and the FAOM were responsible in the past for a total of 12 proposals for the establishment of a Trade Union Law in Macau, all of which were rejected by the AL.

The current proposal, led by the government, was passed on the first reading over one year ago and, since then, has not seen further progress.

This bill does not provide for the right of the workers to go on strike nor for collective bargaining, two of the fundamental principles of this type of law in other jurisdictions.

In the debate at the AL, the Secretary for Economy and Finance, Lei Wai Nong, justified the lack of such provisions with the need for Macau to have “a Trade Union Law adapted to the local characteristics.”

The long wait for laws

The bill is one of several that were noted to have been stalled at the AL for several months without any progress being made in their analysis.

To the media, the lawmaker explained that this happens not because the lawmakers are taking too long to address the new bills and legal regimes but, instead, because the proponent reclaims them for long periods to insert changes.

“What happens is that the government, to show that [it] is working for the population, sends bills to the AL that, after being passed at the first reading with many notes from lawmakers, are sent to a Standing Committee and there the government retrieves that version saying that [it] will present a new version but that never happens or takes a very long time to happen,” the lawmaker explained, adding, “this is one of the big issues that AL has at the moment, the [Standing] Committees have in their hands a lot of bills that [it] seems that the lawmakers are taking too long to address when in reality the bills are in the hands of the government.”

Pereira Coutinho also remarked that this is not the only bill that is in such a situation.

“The Trade Union Law [has] indeed [been] at the AL waiting to be discussed for several months but this is not the one waiting for the longest time. Some bills have been in discussion, inside the different Standing Committees, for over six months and we [the lawmakers] still don’t know how or when the issues [found] will be solved.”

The same lawmaker also noted that in this legislative year, the AL has some very important bills to discuss, namely the Trade Union law as well as the AL elections law.

Addressing the latter, Pereira Coutinho noted that this bill “turned out not to have so many extreme changes as we initially expected and that was of most concern to people,” saying that he hopes that the amendments come at the right time.