Reference no: EM132877605

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The government is unlikely to make any amendment to the law related to trade union (TU) registration despite pressure from the rights groups and international bodies in this regard, sources said.

At present, minimum 20 per cent of total workers' representation is required to get a union registered with the government's authority concerned.

The International Labour Organization (ILO) recommended reducing the minimum threshold for TU registration to 10 per cent of workers or 10 workers (which is lower) to address one of its key concerns regarding the issue.

Bangladesh has been requested to submit a report on the progress made along with a time-bound action plan relating to the complaints until the ILO's 341st governing body (GB) session, scheduled to begin from March 15.

The government is yet to finalise the action plan, recommended by the ILO in its last GB meeting, held virtually last November, they added.

The recommendations came after the labour representatives from Italy, Japan, South Africa, Pakistan and Brazil sought an enquiry commission against Bangladesh for non-observance of three core conventions in the 108th ILO session in mid-June 2019.

Dhaka was then accused of discontinuing Convention 87 on freedom of association and right to organise, Convention 98 on right to organise and collective bargaining, and Convention 81 on labour inspection, mentioned in the complaints submitted under Article 26.

After taking the Bangladesh government's information on freedom of association and its commitments to further improve, the ILO's GB requested the country to develop a time-bound roadmap of actions with tangible outcomes to address all the outstanding issues.

Ministry officials said the ILO recommendations included labour law reform - especially reducing the minimum workers' representation required for TU registration, increasing the number of labour courts by ensuring adequate staffing to address backlog of cases without delay, and recruiting the announced labour inspectors.

A recent meeting, held last week with officials of law and labour ministries, discussed the ILO's concerns that included threshold, violence and harassment against workers and union activists.

The meeting was informed that there was no threshold of union registration in ILO Convention 87, and the organisation recommended amending the provision related to registration.

It also discussed the relevant threshold of some Asian countries, including Sri Lanka, Pakistan, Nepal, India, Cambodia, Indonesia, Malaysia and the Philippines, and opined that Bangladesh might raise the situation of Asian countries in the ILO's next GB meeting.

When asked, Labour Secretary K M Abdus Salam told the FE that they were working to simplify the trade union registration process, and address other issues including harassment and intimidation of workers.

Focusing on the last amendment, he said the government in 2018 reduced the minimum workers' requirement for union registration to 20 per cent from 30 per cent.

"This year, we are yet to decide on the threshold, and discussion is going on in this regard," he added.

The number of registered TUs in the country's ready-made garment (RMG) sector has increased significantly in the last seven years, but most of these are allegedly non-functional, according to industry insiders.

There were only 132 registered trade unions in 2012, which rose to 945 until August 2020, according to official data.

Some 37 per cent of the applications for union registration in the RMG sector were rejected in 2014. The rejection rate was 45 per cent, 33 per cent and 30 per cent in 2015, 2016 and 2017 respectively. In 2020, the rate of registration rejection was only 14 per cent.

The success rate of TU registration increased after the government had adopted the standard operating procedures (SOPs) in 2017. The legal changes, brought to simplify the registration process, also encouraged many to apply, officials said.

More than 80 per cent of the unions were registered in 2018, but the success rate fell to 73 per cent in 2019, they added.