LAHORE, July 26: Federal Labour Secretary Farhat Hussain has said that the new Industrial Relations Ordinance would be promulgated by the end of August or early September.
Speaking at a meeting at the Lahore Chamber of Commerce and Industry here on Friday, Mr Hussain said 26 labour laws were being simplified, rationalized and consolidated into six namely the IRO, Wages Ordinance, Conditions of Employment Ordinance, Human Resource Development Ordinance, Occupation Safety and Health Ordinance and Labour Welfare and Social Security Ordinance.
He said that draft IRO 2002 was ready and would be presented before the Federal Cabinet in a week. The law drafted after provincial level consultations would replace IRO 1969.
He said the new labour policy had been formulated with tripartite consensus on the basis of 82 recommendations of the tripartite conference held at Islamabad in July last year. It would be the 5th labour policy in the history of the country. The previous labour policies were given in 1955, 1959, 1969 and 1979.
He said that the government had decided to award ‘eight workers excellence awards’ every year. Two workers would be selected from every province for the award of Rs 100,000 each under the scheme. Efforts were being made to get the first awards distributed by President Musharraf on Aug 14.
Punjab Labour Secretary Iqbal Ahmed said the government had adopted a non-intrusive approach towards the industrial sector without compromising on the rights of the workers. Its role was that of a promoter of the bipartite concept.
He said the Punjab Governor had approved the constitution of the Human Resource Boards at the district level. The boards headed by the District Nazimeen would be constituted after notification within a week. Committees on health, labour laws, housing and education would function under the boards for the collection of necessary data.
He said development funds of Rs620 million, marriage and death grant funds of Rs392 million and teaching standards improvement grant of Rs192 million had been provided to the Punjab Workers Welfare Fund this year. Seven labour colonies and schools schemes were at various stages of completion and another seven were in the pipeline. Comsats had reserved 30 per cent quota for workers’ children in all disciplines.