Direct Request (CEACR) - adopted 2011, published 101st ILC session (2012)

Freedom of Association and Protection of the Right to Organise Convention, 1948 (No. 87) - Ecuador (Ratification: 1967)

Article 2 of the Convention. Right of workers to form and join organizations. In its previous comments, the Committee took note of two bills under debate in the National Assembly, namely: the Basic Public Service Bill and the Basic Bill on Public Enterprises. The Committee notes that they were enacted into law on 24 July 2009 and 6 October 2010, respectively. The Committee observes that section 18 of the Basic Act on Public Enterprises refers only to associations of workers. It further observes that the Act makes no reference to associations of public servants who are freely appointed and removed or associations of career public servants. The Committee requests the Government to indicate whether public servants who are freely appointed and removed and career public servants of public enterprises enjoy the rights laid down in the Convention.

Furthermore, the Committee again asks the Government to provide information on the number of associations established for the promotion and defence of the interests of public servants, the sectors covered and the approximate number of members.

Lastly, in its previous comments, the Committee referred to article 326(9) of the Constitution which provides that: “for all purposes of the employment relationship in state institutions, the labour sector shall be represented by a single organization”. The Committee points out that to impose a trade union monopoly in state institutions or bodies is not compatible with the requirements of the Convention. The Committee again requests the Government to indicate whether this provision prevents the establishment of more than one organization in each public body or institution, or merely gives preferential rights for collective bargaining to the most representative organization, and to indicate whether once an organization becomes the most representative, it may exercise such preferential rights in the place of the organization that no longer has the majority.

Article 3. Right to strike. The Committee notes that section 24 of the Basic Act on Public Enterprises allows for the right to strike, with the restriction laid down in article 326(15) of the Constitution of the Republic (on which the Committee commented, observing that essential services were defined too broadly) and that section 31(3) prohibits employees in public enterprises from “suspending on any grounds the provision of public services or the exploitation of natural resources carried on by public enterprises, except in the event of force majeure or unforeseen circumstances”. The Committee also observes that section 24(h) of the Basic Public Service Act prohibits public servants from suspending, on any grounds, the following public services, inter alia: education, justice and social security, electric energy, public transportation and postal services. The Committee points out that the right to strike is not an unqualified right and that restrictions or even prohibitions may be imposed in exceptional circumstances. Apart from the armed forces and the police, whose members may be excluded from the scope of the Convention, the right to strike may be restricted or prohibited in: (1) the public service in the case of public servants exercising authority in the name of the State; (2) essential services in the strict sense of the term, namely services the interruption of which would endanger the life or personal safety of the whole or part of the population; and (3) situations of acute national or local crisis. In these circumstances, the Committee requests the Government to take the necessary measures, bearing in mind the abovementioned principle, to amend section 31(3) of the Basic Act on Public Enterprises and section 24(h) of the Basic Public Service Act, and to report all progress in this regard.