One can say that the country is not too poorly served by labour laws and regulations. Trade union providing collective bargaining of workers with their employers are generally allowed in the industries and services here. Labour courts in Bangladesh have been protecting workers' rights and enforcing laws such as compensation to be paid to workers by employers for the breach of labour laws on their part. Bangladesh is a full fledged signatory nation associated to the International Labour Organisation (ILO) and remains committed on the whole to ILO policies.
The example of the garments industries also demonstrates that it should be a prudent course for eligible workers in Bangladesh to first find employment in sectors like the garments industries than to restrict the flourishment of such emerging work opportunities by attempting to introduce trade unions in them early in the day.
More employment and some income should be a better choice for the country's workforce with its vast number of the unemployed than no employment and no income from too much of trade unionism. Thus, there is a need for responsible trade unionism in the country if there exists a genuine interest among workers' leaders to best advance the longer term interests of their followers. Of course, it is not meant that pressure for better looking after the welfare needs of workers ought not to be there when the new enterprises graduate into stronger entities and, thus, become able to smoothly accommodate reasonable demands from their workers.
Md Amanullah
Tejgaon, Dhaka
Right direction for trade unions
FE Team | Published: September 19, 2007 00:00:00 | Updated: February 01, 2018 00:00:00
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