Direct Request (CEACR) - adopted 2017, published 107th ILC session (2018)

Freedom of Association and Protection of the Right to Organise Convention, 1948 (No. 87) - Caribbean Part of the Netherlands

Article 3 of the Convention. Right of workers’ organizations to organize their administration and activities. The Committee recalls that, in its previous comments relating to the Netherlands Antilles, it had highlighted the need to amend section 374(a), (b) and (c) of the Penal Code and section 82 of Ordinance No. 159 of 1964 containing the Conditions of Service of Public Servants, which prohibited public employees, including teachers, from striking under penalty of imprisonment. The Committee had previously noted the Government’s indication that not all Dutch legislation and policies applied directly to the islands of Bonaire, St. Eustatius and Saba, which had become part of the country (that is, the Caribbean Part of the Netherlands), and that the Antilles legislation that had been in force on those three islands prior to the dissolution of the Netherlands Antilles on 10 October 2010, remained the same. The Committee notes with interest that, pursuant to the Kingdom Act of 3 December 2014, the reservations formerly made for the then Netherlands Antilles, which rendered Articles 6(4) of the European Social Charter and 8(1)(d) of the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (right to strike) not applicable to civil servants, have been withdrawn with the accord of the Government at Kingdom level, and that this is also valid for the Caribbean Part of the Netherlands. The Committee notes the Government’s indication that this means that henceforth civil servants also have a right to strike. The Committee requests the Government to indicate the measures contemplated or taken with a view to giving effect in law and in practice to the decision to revoke the restriction on the civil servants’ right to strike in the Caribbean Part of the Netherlands, including by aligning the relevant legislation with the Convention.