By Moon Gwang-lip
Staff Reporter
Tensions between labor and government are escalating over a controversial bill on non-regular workers, as labor unions threaten to call a general strike to block the legislation.

The National Assembly’s Environment and Labor Committee failed to hand over the bill to its general session for legislation due to lawmakers from the progressive Democratic Labor Party (DLP) blockading a room where a committee meeting was scheduled on Wednesday and Thursday.




Members of the Federation of Korean Trade Unions (FKTU) lie down and shout slogans calling on the government and the ruling party to postpone the passage of the bill on non-regular workers in front of the presidential office Chong Wa Dae, central Seoul, Friday. They threatened to stage a general strike if their demand is ignored.
/Korea Times

The ruling Uri Party initially planned to finalize the discussion by Wednesday to pass the bill this month after a five-day review on its legal aspects.
Despite the DLP’s action, the ruling party decided to skip the committee deliberations and hold the Assembly’s general meeting to railroad passage of the bill before the end of June, saying no further changes to the bill are required.

As the conflict shows little sign of easing, President Roh Moo-hyun urged labor unions to compromise on the government-initiated bill during a meeting with an award ceremony for exemplary workers and employers at Chong Wa Dae yesterday.

Uri Party lawmakers, who belong to the committee, said the bill has already been through enough discussions and should be legislated as quickly as possible to protect non-regular workers.

Woo Won-shik, from Uri Party, said, ``The focus of the bill is to make sure non-regular workers are not discriminated against. Its protection measures for those workers are almost the same as that in developed countries.’’

``While the bill is pending at the National Assembly, non-regular workers are vulnerable and may be laid off without having a say,’’ said Woo, claiming the urgent legislation of the bill.

The government-initiated bill was drawn up last September in a bid to protect non-regular workers, as well as to ensure labor market flexibility, and was sent to the National Assembly for legislation.

However, it is still pending approval from the Assembly, as labor groups protest it would lead to an increase in the number of non-regular workers and only serves employers’ interests.

DLP lawmaker Jo Seoung-soo was quick to fight back against the Uri Party, saying, ``The Uri Party lawmakers are defying discussion with the labor community and just trying to pass the bill, which is the worst among the bills drawn by the party.’’

Dan Byung-ho, one of the DLP legislators occupying the Assembly room, also said, ``When we agreed to withhold discussion of the bill from April to June, we wanted to postpone the passage of the bill to iron out our differences.’’

``We want the legislation of a bill which contains substantial protection measures for non-regular workers,’’ the union leader-turned-lawmaker added.

Conflict ensued outside the National Assembly as well.

The two umbrella unions have threatened to state a joint general strike to block the passage of the bill.

The heads of the two umbrella unions groups _ Lee Soo-ho, president of the Korean Confederation of Trade Unions (KCTU), and Lee Yong-deuk, president of the Federation of Korean Trade Unions (FKTU) _ held the joint media conference Thursday in front of the National Assembly.

They said, ``We can’t tolerate the lawmakers’ bid to pass the bill this month. That brings every outcome of the tripartite efforts to nothing.’’

``The haste in handling the bill will just create greater polarization between regular and non-regular workers, stirring up serious social conflict,’’ they said.

``The National Assembly’s refusal to talk with us and its persistence to pass the bill will lead to an unprecedented large-sized general strike from nationwide workers,’’ they added.

They suggested that the government and the ruling party postpone the legislation process until September to come to a compromise.

``The government-initiated bill still has no measures that prevent employers from exploiting non-regular workers.’’ said the FKTU president.

``If the tripartite members fail to reach an agreement again in July or August, we will let lawmakers deal with the bill at the Assembly plenary session in September,’’ he added.

The April bid to pass the bill in the National Assembly seemed to almost work with the three parties’ last-ditch efforts, but it failed again due to remaining differences.

There were two points that remain unsettled: what restrictions should be made on the hiring of part-time workers and whether to guarantee part-timers a full-time position after working under contract for a few years.

joseph@koreatimes.co.kr