Regeringen i Dhaka har mandag givet de lavt betalte arbejdere i landets enorme tekstilindustri ret til at danne fagforeninger uden først at skulle spørge fabriksejerne – og nu vil vestlige tøjfirmaer sikre bedre arbejds- og sikkerhedsforhold og brandværn.
The government amended (ændrede) the 2006 Labour Act lifting restrictions on forming trade unions in most industries, spokesman Mosharraf Hossain Bhuiyan said, according to BBC online Monday.
This comes a day after the government created a new panel of union representatives and factory workers to raise the minimum wage for garment workers.
However, trade union leaders have responded cautiously to the changes: “The issue is not really about making a new law or amending the old one,” Kalpana Akter of the Bangladesh Centre for Workers Solidarity said. She fears for the pressure on individual workers in spite of all laws.
“In the past whenever workers tried to form associations they were subjected to beatings and harassment (chikane). Or they were fired”, she noted.
Bangladesh’s main textile association says as many as 300 textile factories in an area near the capital, Dhaka, have shut due to worker unrest sparked by the collapse of the Rana Plaza. At least 1.127 bodies have been recovered from the building.
Four major Western retailers, among them Swedish H&M, said on Monday they will back an International Labour Organisation-led agreement on fire and building safety that has been under negotiation since the factory collapsed on 24 April.
The contract would require them to conduct safety inspections, pay for repairs and stop doing business with any factory that refuses to make necessary safety improvements.
