Home ›› 01 May 2023 ›› Editorial
The people of Bangladesh are observing the historic May Day today as elsewhere in the world to show respect to the workers, who shed their blood to establish the rights of the working class in 1886. On this day, the workers of the Hay Market of Chicago City in the US laid down their lives for ensuring an eight-hour working day for them. Since then, the day is observed all over the world as a day of solidarity with working people.
The labour movement has a glorious past in our country. Bangladesh is a signatory to the ILO convention and has several legislations for labour welfare. On this momentous day, some questions haunt the minds of those who genuinely feel for the just cause of the working class.
The labour unions in many cases serve dubious purposes that sometimes lead to the closure of the industrial units. There is a general notion that a sound employer-employee relationship may help ensure productivity and well-being of the workers. The wages invariably have to be linked with productivity and the demand for higher wages cannot reasonably be pressed without increasing production. Workers in Bangladesh, especially the garment industry, the shipbuilding industry, the construction industry, and other non-government sectors, the millions of workers do not receive their fair wages and are deprived of their various rights. Workers' rights are still limited to paper and pen, but in reality, workers do not enjoy their full rights. It is time to restore their rights. The basic needs of the workers are neglected due to the employer-worker conflict. Workers are often injured or killed in accidents at the workplace but they are deprived of adequate compensation.
We have a lot of women workers in our country and they still have to cope with various adverse environments to survive in the workplace. Women and child labourers are seen in a variety of hazardous jobs, and the situation of migrant women workers abroad is even direr, especially in the Middle East. Migrant women workers send large amounts of remittances to the country and contribute to the economy, but these women migrant workers are regularly subjected to various forms of sexual harassment and abuse. The safety of women workers in the workplace is still neglected and about 9 lakh migrant women workers are contributing to the economic development of the country but their safety has not been ensured yet.
In the context of our country, one can say that the country is not too poorly served by labour laws and regulations on the employers. Trade union practices providing collective bargaining of workers with their employers are generally allowed in the industries and services here. Labour courts in Bangladesh promote and protect workers' rights and enforce laws such as compensation to be paid to workers by employers for the breach of labour laws on their part. There is a need for responsible trade unionism in the country, if there exists a genuine interest among workers' leaders to best advance the longer-term interests of their followers.
It, however, needs to be stressed here that mere hikes in wages and other fringe benefits for the workers will not serve the purpose of sustainable growth of the economy. The level of skill and efficiency of the labour force matters most for the competitive survival of any industry in the global marketplace. Wages have to be linked, in one way or another, to productivity. If that is made so, profitable operations of the industrial enterprises will be ensured on a sustained footing.
