Direct Request (CEACR) - adopted 2005, published 95th ILC session (2006)

Labour Inspection Convention, 1947 (No. 81) - Republic of Korea (Ratification: 1992)

The Committee notes that the Government’s report has not been received. It hopes that a report will be supplied for examination by the Committee at its next session and that it will contain full information on the matters raised by the Committee on the Application of Standards at the 92nd session of the International Labour Conference (June 2004) and in its previous direct request, which read as follows:

The Committee requests the Government to provide further information on the following points.

1. Labour inspection staff and frequency of inspection visits (Articles 10 and 16). Further to its previous comments, the Committee notes the Government’s indication that the current number of inspectors is not large enough to cover the workplaces and employees as the application of the Labour Standards Act was expanded to cover all workplaces on 1 January 1999. It has therefore computerized the labour inspection service to promote efficiency of the work of inspectors, since it would have been difficult to increase the number of labour inspectors, which had already passed from 974 in 1999 to 1,055 in 2001 despite the overall job retrenchment in public services.

The Committee also notes the information in the Government’s reports that in 1998 general inspectors conducted 110,752 inspection visits; that however, in 2000, the number of visits was reduced to 1,994, which represents only 0.17 per cent of the total number of workplaces liable to inspection (1,197,000). Considering that the size of the general labour inspection staff is 739, it turns out that each inspector on average conducted merely 2.6 inspection visits during the year 2000.

The Committee requests the Government: (i) to provide additional information on the computerization of the labour inspection service, in particular on the Workplace Digitalization System launched in January 2003, and to supply any evaluation on the progress achieved in terms of promotion of efficient inspection activities; and (ii) to adopt the appropriate measures to increase the number of labour inspectors and inspection visits in order that workplaces be inspected as often and as thoroughly as necessary and to provide information on any progress made.

2. Right to free access of labour inspectors to workplaces liable to inspection (Article 12, paragraph 1(a) and (b)). With reference to its previous comments, the Committee notes the Government’s indication that, in practice, labour inspectors, as special judicial police officers, occasionally visit workplaces without a written order so as to identify real conditions of the workplaces. It notes, however, that the information supplied by the Government does not specify whether a time limit is imposed on this right to free access of labour inspectors. The Committee asks the Government once again to indicate whether the right for labour inspectors to enter freely and without previous notice "at any hour of the day or night" any workplaces liable to inspection (paragraph 1(a)) is guaranteed as well as the right to enter "by day any premises which they may have reasonable cause to believe to be liable to inspection" (paragraph 1(b)).

3. Annual inspection report (Articles 20 and 21). The Committee notes that the annual inspection report has not been transmitted to the ILO. Recalling that these reports are an essential means of determining how the inspection system functions in practice, it hopes that the Government will not fail to send to the ILO within the time limits provided for in Article 20 copies of annual inspection reports dealing with the subjects mentioned in Article 21.