TNAG-0129-FCO40-165-Labour-legislation-1970 — Page 24

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presented here shortly. We hope, through its provisions,

to increase the maximum limit of benefits for injured

workmen and bring these benefits more into line with the

now generally higher level of wages prevailing. Draft

legislation will also, I hope, be ready for consideration in the near future with a view to establishing better priorities for employees' earned wages when a firm is forced to go into liquidation or bankrupty.

We shall also

be taking draft amending bills to the Employment Ordinance, including one designed to enable workers to take, voluntarily, four rest days a month without breach of their terms of employment, and to provide security of employment for

women who need to take maternity leave.

Another draft

amending bill aims to extend the right to take statutory holidays with pay to non-industrial workers and to improve entitlement to sickness allowances.

I still remain of the view that great scope for improvements in the field of labour-management relations lies in improving the consultative machinery between the factory floor and the management offices. The Labour Department, I know, is doing its utmost to promote joint consultative committees and I look forward to seeing a growing response from all spheres of industry.

Before leaving this topic I would like to mention the idea of labour courts, which we are considering at official levels. I believe there may be merit in the idea of establishing a quicker, simpler mechanism than is provided by recourse to the ordinary courts, of resolving claims for the settlement of legal obligations arising out of contracts

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