Bangladesh has earned its reputation in the international market as one of the top labour intensive countries in the world, with its domestic readymade garment (RMG) industry and internationally recognized labour export sector.
Labour law compliance has increased in significance extensively since the introduction of Labour Act 2006 and the Labour Rules 2015.
Even though the Act has already had some updates over the years such as its amendments in 2013, and 2018, our labour laws have been under severe scrutiny from different international organizations and pressure groups.
The Bangladesh government had reportedly assured the ILO and the EU that significant changes would be made in labour laws by September 2022.
The changes have finally arrived with the first set of amendments to the Labour Rules 2015.
The modifications and additions have touched a lot of significant issues which have been in regular discussion since the Labour Rules 2015 was implemented.
Specific amendments were brought to 99 rules while 2 rules were repealed in this amendment.
Some of the key issues that have been addressed are trade unions, rights of employees under third party contractors, classification of permanent work, incorporation of digital labour registrar, timeline of misconduct investigation procedure and the representative of an accused employee.
Most of these changes were necessary.
For example, for a long time, the position of the rights and entitlements of employees employed under third party contractors have been unclear.
The lack of clarity in the law created legal controversies with regards to third party contracted employees who have claimed that they were not being offered equal pay or provided other financial facilities as the direct employees of the employer.
Even though the employees are directly employed by the third-party contractors on behalf of the employers, more often than not, the discrepancy in payment and facilities led the employees to file legal proceedings against the employer causing unexpected inconvenience and incurrence of costs.
Under the amended Rules 4 and 5, the third-party contractors would now be inclined to pay the employees equal payment to an employee who is directly employed under the employer.
Additionally, if the contractor does not have an already existing gratuity scheme for its employees, the contractor is bound to form a “Workers’ Social Security Fund”, which shall provide them with similar facilities to a gratuity scheme.
Another significant matter is the classification of permanent work.
The amended rule states depending on the nature of work in the entity, any work conducted in an entity which lasts beyond six months period shall be considered a permanent work in that particular entity.
This would significantly change the idea of contractual work.
Previously an employer could offer contractual work for a significant period even for work which if you consider the nature of the employer would be permanent work by nature.
Now, contractual work can only be offered for work which is of temporary nature subject to the interpretation of the labour laws.
The amended rules also allow collective bargaining agencies and/or participating committees to choose the representatives of an employee who is under investigation for misconduct if the employee does not choose his representative within his designated period.
At the same time, the rules have designated the specific time period of 60 days for the investigation as the day from when the show cause notice is served to the day the judgment is passed by the investigation committee.
It brings more certainty to the process of the investigation.
Most important additions
Some of the most important additions to this rule addressed women at the workplace.
Rule 16, for example, now sets the maternity benefit calculation, which now calculates the rate of the total wage divided by 26, which essentially increases the benefit women will receive.
Another exceedingly important change came under Rule 88, which has included a specific set of rules regarding “behavior with women” in the workplace.
This amended rule essentially defines what constitutes “sexual harassment” in the workplace.
There had been a number of case laws regarding this matter, and the interpretation so far had been based on judicial precedent.
With women employed in every corners of the industries from RMG to multinationals and corporate houses, this amendment codifying the definition of sexual harassment was essential.
The labour rules have received its first upgrade after eight years of implementation.
The committee has taken into account some of the significant oversights and gaps in the original rules and made some changes which were much anticipated to bring clarity and certainty in the area.
As Bangladesh gets more integrated to the pace of globalization and the ever-growing world market, keeping updated by refining and reforming our laws to the global standards is of paramount importance.
This amendment to the labour rules is a positive step towards such aspiration.
The authors, both Barristers-at-Law, are associates at Mahbub & Company, a leading law firm