China's national trade union federation yesterday vowed to
better protect migrant workers' rights and absorb more of them into
trade unions.
"Trade unions in China have always been devoted to protecting
migrant workers' rights," said Chen Rongshu, an official with the
All China Federation of Trade Unions, at the 2006 International
Forum on Economic Globalization and Trade Unions yesterday in
Beijing.
Chen said the federation encourages migrant workers to join
trade unions in various forms, such as project unions, market
unions, street unions, community unions, regional and industrial
unions.
By the end of 2005 China had 151 million trade union members,
23.6 million of whom were migrant workers. In the first half of
this year, another 6.5 million migrant workers joined.
In 2005, trade unions across the country helped recover delayed
wages of 1.31 billion yuan (164 million) for 2.79 million migrant
workers.
They also provided instructions for migrant workers to sign work
contracts with their employers.
So far, 9.18 million migrant workers have signed contracts with
their employers, accounting for 40 percent of the migrant workers
who have joined trade unions.
"The most pressing task is to protect migrant workers'
employment rights through introduction and implementation of active
labour market policies," Chen said.
Sun Chunlan, vice-chairman of the federation, said violation of
migrant workers' rights, such as low or delayed wages, long working
hours, harsh working conditions and hurting workers' self-esteem
are still common in some places.
For example, 80 percent of the migrant workers nationwide are
working over 10 hours per day.
Sun said the federation would strive to absorb 8 million migrant
workers into trade unions annually in the coming three years.
China now has 240 million migrant workers, or nearly half of the
total rural workforce.
(China Daily December 5, 2006)