28 March 2004	Sunday	06 Safar 1425

LAHORE, March 27: The Punjab president of the All Pakistan Federation of Trade Unions, Gulzar Chaudhry, has said that workers are suffering because of the indifferent attitude of the government and the industrialists.

He was speaking at the National Conference of Social Security Institutions' session on Health and Socio-economic Problems of Workers and the Role of Industry in Pakistan, here on Saturday.

The labour leader said that the industrialists wanted the workers to work hard like serfs but make no demands.

The Punjab government had prevented the labour department to inspect the factories for monitoring the enforcement of labour laws under its industrial policy which was in violation of the ILO Convention 1986.

He said that labour laws' violations had increased in the province after the discontinuation of inspections of the industrial units.

Most industrialists had not filed the declarations in respect of implementation of the labour laws but the government had not taken any step for the protection of the rights of the workers.

He said that the workers were concerned about the future of facilities like education of their children and healthcare for their families because the provincial government had abolished the education cess and industrial contribution used for funding the social security hospitals and dispensaries.

Social Security Doctors Association's Lahore president Dr Nasir Qureshi said that workers needed more attention because they were among the downtrodden classes of the society.

He said that the Social Security Hospital, Multan Road, was providing facilities like heart bypass surgery and provision of hearing aids to the workers and their families.

The Punjab secretary-general of the Pakistan Medical Association, Dr Ashraf Nizami, said that the provincial government had not been paying 7 per cent social security contribution for the past seven years.

He said that agriculture and brick-kiln workers should also be brought under the social security cover. Social Security Hospital, Multan Road, Medical Superintendent Dr Ejaz Bhatti said that the hospital would soon have the CT Scan, angiography and dialysis facilities for the workers.