Signature Campaign Petition

We all Women Workers, We Entitle the Same Workers' Rights

Part-time workers:

the employed persons whose normal hours of work are less than full-time workers

The International Labour Convention says the rights as part-time workers: same workers' protection as full-time workers, including:

• the right to organise and collective bargaining
• occupational health and safety
• against discrimination in employment and occupation
• a basic wage calculated proportionately as that of full-time workers
• same social security schemes
• maternity protection with respect to termination of employment
• access to training paid annual leave, sick leave and public holidays
• receiving financial compensations or allowances, additional to basic wages, as received
  by full-time workers, including over-time pay
• access to welfare facilities and social services of the establishment, which taking into account of the needs of part-time workers
• access to productive and freely chosen part-time work which meets the needs of both employers and workers
• voluntarily transfer of full-time to part-time work, or vice versa
• information on the above protective measures should be disseminated to part-time workers

Homeworkers:

persons carrying out work at home or premises of their own choice, other than the workplace of employer, and the work is for remuneration, resulting in a product or service as specified by the employer

The International Labour Convention to protect the equality of treatment between homeworkers and other wage earners, taking into account the special characteristics of homeworkers, in particular on:

• the right to organise and collective bargaining
• occupational health and safety
• against discrimination in employment and occupation
• same social security schemes
• maternity protection with respect to termination of employment
• access to training
• paid annual leave, sick leave and public holidays
• receiving remuneration that comparable to that received by workers in the
  enterprise of employer
• minimum age for admission to employment or work
• for reasons of health and safety, certain types of work and the use of certain substances to be prohibited in home work
• receiving compensation by homeworkers for costs incurred in connection with their work, such as use of energy and water, communiations and maintenance of machinery and equipment; and - time spent in maintaining machinery and equipment, changing tools, sorting, unpacking and packing, and other such operations
• homeworkers to be kept informed of:
  • their specific conditions of employment in writing, including name and address of the employer, scale or rate of remuneration and the methods of calculation, the type of work to be performed
  • the guidelines concerning occupational health and safety regulations covering work hazards, precautions to be taken, with languages understood by homeworkers
• homeworkers to be provided of:
  • necessary training regarding occupational health and safety
  • appropriate and properly maintained safety devices and any necessary personal protective equipment, free of charge

We denounce the expansion of the casualisation and flexibilisation of work pattern, not for workers interests and free choice, but for business profits. We denounce the company to retrench regular workers and replace them with casual and flexible forms of workers, including part-time workers, homeworkers, contract workers and dispatch workers, etc. Women workers are always the first target!

We call on the governments to commit themselves to protect women workers rights, particularly in the reality of casualisation and flexibilisation of women labour force that aggravate the exploittion of women workers.

We demand the governments :

• to immediately ratify the ILO Convention on Part-time workers , No. 175; and the ILO Convention on Home Work, No.177
• to establish national policies, laws and regulations according to the ILO conventions to guarantee the legal rights as part-time workers and homeworkers;
• to implement these policies, laws and regulations at local level to ensure that part-time and homeworkers' rights are protected
• to set up an effective and active mechanism to inspect, monitor and ensure the practice and protection to casual and flexible workers
• adequate remedies, including penalties, for violation of these laws and
  regulations shall be provided for and effectively applied.

Please join the campaign
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For information, contact Committee for Asian Women (CAW)
Unite E, 4/F, Skyline Tower, 18 Tong Mei Road, Kowloon, Hong Kong
Telephone: 852-27226150 Fax: 852-23699895 Email: cawhk@hk.super.net
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