Direct Request (CEACR) - adopted 2004, published 93rd ILC session (2005)

Further to its previous comments, the Committee notes that the Government once again refers to the new draft amendment of the Labour Code which is expected to give full effect to Article 2 of the Convention concerning the 11-hour minimum night rest for women employed in industrial undertakings. Recalling that the Government has been giving assurances for several years that the Labour Code will be brought into line with the requirements of the Convention once the revision of the Code is completed, the Committee hopes that the draft amendment will be adopted without further delay and requests the Government to indicate in its next report any progress made in this regard.

Moreover, the Committee notes that under the draft amendment, the Labour Minister is empowered to authorize variations to the duration of the night period and to suspend the prohibition of night work provided that the workers concerned explicitly consent to such measures and that the establishment in question offers sufficient guarantees in respect of occupational safety and health. The Committee is obliged to observe that the provision on exemption possibilities and variations in the duration of the night period is not in strict conformity with the Convention but might be permissible - subject to certain conditions - under the more flexible standards set forth in the 1990 Protocol to Convention No. 89.

In this respect, the Committee wishes to refer to paragraphs 191-202 of its 2001 General Survey on the night work of women in industry, in which it observed that the present trend is no doubt to move away from a blanket prohibition against women’s night work and to give the social partners the responsibility for determining the extent of the permitted exemptions. It also noted that many countries are in the process of easing or eliminating legal restrictions on women’s employment during the night with the aim of improving women’s opportunities in employment and strengthening non-discrimination. The Committee further recalled that member States are under an obligation to review periodically their protective legislation in light of scientific and technological knowledge with a view to revising all gender-specific provisions and discriminatory constraints. This obligation stems from Article 11(3) of the 1979 United Nations Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women (to which parenthetically Lebanon acceded in 1997), as later reaffirmed in point 5(b) of the 1985 ILO resolution on equal opportunities and equal treatment for men and women in employment.

More concretely, the Committee considered that the Protocol of 1990 to Convention No. 89 was designed as a tool for smooth transition from outright prohibition to free access to night employment, especially for those States that wished to offer the possibility of night employment to women workers but felt that some institutional protection should remain in place to avoid exploitative practices and a sudden worsening of the social conditions of women workers. It also suggested that greater efforts should be made by the Office to help those constituents who are still bound by the provisions of Convention No. 89, and who are not yet ready to ratify the new Night Work Convention, 1990 (No. 171), to realize the advantages of modernizing their legislation in line with the provisions of the Protocol.

Therefore, the Committee once again invites the Government to give favourable consideration to the ratification of the 1990 Protocol which affords greater flexibility in the application of the Convention while remaining focused on the protection of female workers. As regards the Government’s request for the informal opinion of the Office concerning the meaning and implications of certain provisions of the Protocol, the Committee is informed that the Office has replied by letter dated 9 June 2003 (ref. ACD 5-89). Finally, the Committee would be grateful to the Government for providing, in accordance with Part V of the report form, up-to-date information concerning the practical application of the Convention, including for instance extracts from reports of inspection services, statistics on the number of workers covered by relevant legislation, the application of the exceptions allowed under the provisions of the Convention, etc.