REIN
REGISTRY No. 51 2001771
HKKS/
RESTRICTED
HONG KONG
NOTE OF A MEETING HELD AT THE TRADES UNION CONGRESS, GREAT RUSSELL STREET, LONDON WC1, AT 10.30 AM
ON TUESDAY, 5 JANUARY 1971, TO DISCUSS THE TRADE UNION REGISTRATION (AMENDMENT) BILL.
Present:
Mr J A Hargreaves
TUC
Miss M Nicholson
TUC
Mr H R G Hurst
FCO
Mr D I Goodwin
FCO (ODA)
Mr J Allen
Registrar of Trade Unions,
Hong Kong
Miss B A Davies
FCO
1.
Corporate Status of Trade Unions (S.13 of the principal Ordinance)
Points made by TUC
The
For a trade union to be regarded as a body corporate had wide implications including liability for criminal actions, for example conspiracy. It conferred on a trade union the legal status of a business and business was not a trade union's principal occupation or purpose. Why should trade union members have to pay fines for officials who were crooks? situation was ready-made to say in some future amendment that trade unions were penally liable for industrial misconduct. Why had this unusual provision been included in the Hong Kong law? Were the unions aware that they could have the advantages, for example, of owing property, without the liabilities of corporate status?
Points made by Officials
The purpose of conferring corporate status on trade unions in Hong Kong had been to help and protect the unions as they were property owners and some of their objects were, in fact, the conduct of business. The Hong Kong unions were satisfied with this status. The Ordinance already provided for com- mission of offences by unions and the amendment proposed to Section 33 was merely to regularise the payment of resultant fines from union funds. The effects of Section 61 should also not be overlooked in that individual officers could remain personally liable even if the charge was in the name of the union. If a trade union was taken to court, for example for a failure to submit returns, it would be up to the General Secretary to show that he was not liable. Hong Kong
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