Author Archives: e.bechis@itcilo.org

Exclusive responsibility can help responsiveness

Ms. Dorine Monica Brooks, Director, International Labour Agencies and Information, ILO Desk Officer, Ministry of Labour and Social Security, Jamaica describes how exclusive responsibility can help responsiveness.

“Jamaica is one of the few Caribbean islands that has created an office in the Ministry of Labour and Social Security and that has an officer that deals exclusively with ILS matters. This has helped to facilitate greater ease in locating documents sent to the Ministry by the ILO, because what happened is that whatever comes in sent to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, but it is then sent directly to the ILO Office at the Ministry of Labour. This is a guarantee of greater promptness in producing responses and replies to most requests, e.g. questionnaires, report forms, unratified conventions, etc.”

An example of the responsible authority’s organization

Ms. Celeste M. Valderrama, Director, International Labor Affairs Bureau, Department of Labor and Employment, Philippines, describes the organization of the authority responsible for ILS and ILS reporting (December, 2011).

Overview of operations – Responsible manager

“I am Maria Celeste Valderrama and I head the International Labor Affairs Bureau which handles the International Labour Organization’s concerns like compliance to the international labour standards, as well as of course our reportorial obligations under the ILO constitution. The International labor affairs bureau under the Department of Labor and Employment has four major functions. One is ensuring our commitment under the ILO, second is maintaining our technical cooperation program with multilateral, bilateral and other international organizations and the third is supervising a group of labor attachés posted in about 38 posts abroad. Our labor posts actually provide services to the Filipino workers who are overseas, numbering… it’s about, it’s estimated at about 8 millions. We also have a group which handles the resource requirements of these posts, which is still a fairly large responsibility on our part. To do our work in ensuring that we are able to comply with the reportorial obligations of the ILS, we coordinate quiet extensively with our frontline officers with other bureaus handling the major programs of the department. ILAB has a personnel complement of 24 people and five of them take charge of the international labour standards monitoring. About seven of the remaining 19 people take charge of Middle East affairs, about seven handle Asia and the Pacific affairs and then we have another group handling Europe and America. So three operational units plus one group handling multilateral cooperation. They are the ones handling the ILS and the ILO concerns… All of the ILO concerns.”

Special thanks go to the Honorable Secretary of Labor and Employment of the Philippines, and the Director and staff of the International Labor Affairs Bureau of the Department of Labor of the Philippines for their generous cooperation in the production of this video.

An example of arrangements for submission to the competent national authority

Ms. Delia S. Palomar, Chief Labor and Employment Officer, International Relations and Cooperation Division, Department of Labor and Employment, Philippines, describes how submission to the competent national authorities of newly adopted ILS is effectuated (December, 2011).

Arrangements for submission to the competent national authorities

“First submission to the competent authorities. As soon as we receive the document from the ILO requesting to the transmitted to National competent authorities we draft the memo or the letter to the Office of the Senate president and the Speaker of the House citing the importance of the convention and referring it to them for future legislation. So upon transmitting the text of the convention or the recommendation, we solicit the acknowledgement or whatever decisions the Senate or Congress will take into account for the said conventions. Like right now we just received the acknowledgement receipt from the House of Representatives acknowledging that they have received the text of the domestic work convention. In the case of the Domestic work Convention, we are in close coordination with the national competent authorities because we also consulted them for its certification and we indicated in our transmittal letter that the same is being referred to them because there is an action to ratify the convention. But in most cases we just notify them that there is a new convention or a new international instrument that should be taken into account in future legislation. In submitting the instrument to competent authorities, we indicate that it is in compliance with our obligation as a member State of the ILO and such instrument could be considered in their drafting of bills.”

Special thanks got to the Honorable Secretary of Labor and Employment of the Philippines, and the Director and staff of the International Labor Affairs Bureau of the Department of Labor of the Philippines for their generous cooperation in the production of this video.

Accessing legal expertise

Ms. Celeste M. Valderrama, Director, International Labor Affairs Bureau, Department of Labor and Employment, Philippines, describes how legal expertise is accessed on an “as-needed” basis (December, 2011).

How is legal expertise brought into use?

“In previous years in the history of the ILAB, the office used to be ILAD, there were lawyers who were part of the personnel handling the division, the division handling the ILS. But they have left, they are gone now and we cannot anymore hire lawyers. So what do we do? With the limited resources, with the limited personnel that we have, we engage lawyers from all the other bureaus and so they provide a substantial… the substance to the report. We have lawyers from the Bureau of Labor relations, from the Bureau of Working Conditions, from the PRC for instance and the POEA. They are the ones handling the substantive reporting. I cannot really say do I need a lawyer, but a lawyer would be good, a lawyer would be helpful to do this ILS work here in this division, but if there is none, then we can accept the services of lawyers within the Department also, who provide the input to the report that we submit. I think the very controversial part of the report pertains to freedom of association and collective bargaining, I think for those areas we need a lawyer and then for that the Bureau of Labor relations provide that kind of  inputs.”

Special thanks go to the Honorable Secretary of Labor and Employment of the Philippines, and the Director and staff of the International Labor Affairs Bureau of the Department of Labor of the Philippines for their generous cooperation in the production of this video.

Use unrelated gatherings as a means of tapping the attention of social partners

In Peru, social partners are intercepted and involvement solicited.

In Peru, it has been reported that when there are difficulties in securing the attention and involvement of the social partners in matters related to ILS reporting, their representatives can be “intercepted” at other official or business gatherings and involvement personally solicited.

Use specialists’ visit

In Tajikistan, the social partners are briefed when the ILS specialist from DWT/CO Office visits.

In Tajikistan, it is reported that when the ILO specialist on ILS visits the country, meetings are arranged for briefing tripartite partners on improving the quality of reports on ILS application.

In addition to briefing government officials, ILS specialists can brief and train the social partners in reporting processes. This may improve their responsiveness as well as the quality of their involvement in ILS reporting.

Use social dialogue to resolve issues

In Panama, social dialogue on report contents is used to resolve issues.

It is reported that in Panama, successful social dialogue is seen as a way to resolve issues arising from the application of ILS before they are taken to the ILO. So, although there are challenges faced in dialogue, the benefit derived from resolving issues through the process are seen to be important, and worth the effort.

The value of institutionalized tripartite structure

Ms. Catherine Abayao, Labor and Employment Officer, International Relations and Cooperation Division, Department of Labor and Employment, Philippines describes the benefit of established tripartite structures and high level support (December, 2011).

Institutionalized tripartite arrangements and high-level support

“Hi, I am Catherine Duladul and I work with Miss Delia and the International Labour Standards division and I have been with this division for seven years now. I want to share here the successes or the success that we have here in the department in producing our report to the ILO on time. First, because we have an established tripartite structure as explained by my colleagues a while ago. We have an institutionalized tripartite structure and an executive order. It is a policy making body where all our reports to the ILO are subjected to this tripartite body. And also one more thing here is that our official, the secretary herself is also very interested in ILO matters. She is knowledgeable in how ILO standards are being adapted and then when a certain country has ratified a certain convention. She knows the obligations that a ratifying State has too. So… in our case we had to work well and submit our reports on time because our heads are aware of our obligations.”

Special thanks go to the Honorable Secretary of Labor and Employment of the Philippines, and the Director and staff of the International Labor Affairs Bureau of the Department of Labor of the Philippines for their generous cooperation in the production of this video.

The usefulness of expert advice

Ms. Dorine Monica Brooks, Director, International Labour Agencies and Information, ILO Desk Officer, Ministry of Labour and Social Security, Jamaica tells how external expert advice is called upon.

“We call upon professionals from our main University of West Indies, Mona Campus, and sometimes University of Technology to advice the Minister and all the persons within the Ministry on ILS matters.”

Legislative provisions on consultation

Ms. Gloria Beatriz Gaviria Ramos, Chief, Oficina de Cooperación y Relaciones Internacionales, Ministerio del Trabajo, Colombia described legislative provision on tripartite consultation.

“Under Colombian law, our political Constitution, a National Consultation Committee was set up, which is the highest tripartite body existing in Colombia and this Committee specifically deals with all obligations associated with ILS, reports and the ratification of Conventions  – and this Committee asked the International Affairs Committee [ … ], which we set up, to deal with all these cases. This Committee meets once a month and recently, for example, we held a meeting to decide on the make-up of the Conference delegation – but we also carries out a tripartite analysis on the reports that we are to present to the ILO.”