TNAG-0452-FCO40-517-Legislation-for-employment-of-workers-in-Hong-Kong-1974 — Page 240

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INTERNATIONAL DU TRAVAIL

NO

OFICINA INTERNACIONAL DEL TRAS

13 DEC. 1973,

Adresse postale: CH 1211 GENÈVE 22

Télégrammes INTERLAB GENÈVE

Télex 22.271

Téléphone 31 24 00 & 32 62 00

ACD 8-2-129-98

Réf. n° ACD 5-98

Confidential

INTERNATIONAL LABOUR OFFICE

Minnie

18/12

L

1

170078

·Mr. G. Foggon,

Foreign and Commonwealth Office. LONDON, S.W.1.

(Angleterre)

?

Dear Mr. Foggon,

314.

Now that you must be back from Wairobi, I should like to refer to your letter of 23 November 1973, concerning proposed amendments to the legislation of Hong Kong and how these might fit in with Convention No. 98. As usual our comments do not prejudge, of course, the opinion of the supervisory bodies of the ILO.

The provisions of the Bill would be appropriate to the imple- mentation of Article 1 of Convention No. 98 with one omission. The rights and protection of Article l'apply to workers not only already "employees" as that term is defined in the interpretation seation (s. 2) of the Employment Ordinance, 1968, but also to persons taking up employment (and thus who are not yet "employees"); as provided in Article 1, 2a) of the Convention.

There appears

to be no provision in the proposed amendments, nor in the Ordinance in its present form which would protect workers in respect of acts calculated to make their hiring subject to the condition that they shall not join a union or shall relinquish, union membership.

With respect to, Article 2 of the Convention (protection against acts of interference), I should point out that neither in the Employment Ordinance itself, nor in the Trade Disputes Ordinance, Revised Ordinances of Hong Kong, 1964, No. 64, the Trade Unions Ordinance, ROHK, 1971, c. 332, nor in the Trade Union Registration Regulations passed under the latter Ordinance, is there any provision which would implement the guarantees established in this Article of the Convention.

Some sections of the Trade Union Ordinance mentioned above do provide for inspection of union accounts. If a union were receiving contributions from an employer, the fact might be evident in its accounts, but this fact alone does not seem a sufficient deterrent for the type of interference described in Article 2..

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