Direct Request (CEACR) - adopted 2008, published 98th ILC session (2009)

Forced Labour Convention, 1930 (No. 29) - Botswana (Ratification: 1997)

Article 2(2)(c) of the Convention. Work of prisoners for the benefit of private persons. The Committee notes the Government’s statement in the report that the Prison Act does not authorize the hiring or placement of convicted prisoners at the disposal of private individuals. However, as the Committee noted previously, under section 94(1) of the Prisons Act (Cap. 21:03), a prisoner may be employed outside a prison under the immediate order and for the benefit of a person other than a public authority.

The Committee again draws the Government’s attention to the provisions of Article 2(2)(c) of the Convention, which expressly prohibits that convicted prisoners are hired to or placed at the disposal of private individuals, companies or associations, in a sense that the exception from the scope of the Convention provided for in this Article for compulsory prison labour does not extend to work of prisoners for private employers, even under public supervision and control.

The Committee refers in this connection to the explanations given in paragraphs 59–60 and 114–120 of its General Survey of 2007 on the eradication of forced labour, where it pointed out that work of prisoners for private parties is only compatible with the Convention where it does not involve compulsory labour and is carried out with the freely given consent of the persons concerned. The Committee has also considered that, in the context of a captive labour force having no alternative access to the free labour market, the most reliable indicator of the voluntariness of labour is the work performed under conditions approximating a free labour relationship, which include wage levels (leaving room for deductions and attachments), social security and occupational safety and health. There may be also other factors that can be regarded as objective and measurable advantages which the prisoner gains from the actual performance of the work and which could be considered in determining whether consent was freely given and informed (such as the learning of new skills which could be deployed by prisoners when released; the offer of continuing the work of the same type upon their release; or the opportunity to work cooperatively in a controlled environment enabling them to develop team skills).

The Committee therefore hopes that the necessary measures will be taken, both in law and in practice, to ensure that any work or service by prisoners for private persons is performed voluntarily, which necessarily requires the freely given and informed consent of the prisoners concerned, such consent being authenticated by the existence of objective and measurable factors as explained above. Pending the adoption of such measures, the Committee again requests the Government to supply specimen copies of agreements concluded between prison authorities and private users of prison labour, as well as information concerning conditions of work of prisoners for private employers, including copies of prescribed earnings schemes to which reference is made in sections 94(3) and 95 of the Prisons Act.