Individual Case (CAS) - Discussion: 2011, Publication: 100th ILC session (2011)

Labour Inspection Convention, 1947 (No. 81) - Saudi Arabia (Ratification: 1978)

The Government communicated statistical information, which is contained in Appendix III to the present report. In addition, before the Committee, a Government representative reaffirmed that his Government was eager to reinforce labour inspection, and referred to the recent establishment of a new position of Assistant Deputy Minister for Labour Inspection and the assignment of 1,000 new inspection posts in the Ministry of Labour in order to ensure greater efficiency, effectiveness and wider coverage of all regions of the Kingdom. Directives had been issued to a number of government departments to support labour inspectors. In addition, new labour inspection forms were developed to include details of quantitative and qualitative statistics of the inspected facilities, their employees and the nature of the infringements observed. The Ministry of Labour had recently finished the development of a detailed and unified database through which all the statistical variables could be followed, thus facilitating the work of the inspection services. The new database would help producing detailed inspection reports, including full details on employees, nationalities and the nature of work. The Government representative indicated that recent statistics had shown increased inspection levels and efficiency. Inspection visits increased from 46,446 in 2006 to 90,048 in 2010, while the number of inspectors for the same period increased from 147 inspectors to 210. The amount of fines increased from US$531,000 in 2008 to US$2 million in 2010. He referred to the written information that was presented to the Committee and estimated that in the future, due to the assignment of 1,000 new inspectors, there would be more detailed statistics that would not only result in an improvement of the working environment, but also in achieving higher rates of compliance with applicable international labour standards. He concluded by referring to an agreement between the Ministry of Labour and the ILO Office in Beirut concerning the establishment of a policy and strategy unit in the Ministry of Labour, thus greatly enhancing the technical expertise and capacity of the Ministry, including in matters related to labour inspection.

The Worker members emphasized the importance of this governance Convention which was essential so that workers could effectively enjoy their rights at work and social protection. By detecting violations of labour legislation, labour inspection allowed the competent authorities to take the necessary measures to resolve the problems identified. The observation of the Committee of Experts dealt mainly with statistical information on the violations committed and the penalties imposed which needed to be included in the annual inspection report. Such information was essential to determine the extent to which the legislation regulating conditions of work and protection of workers while engaged in their work was effectively observed. It was particularly important to have such information in the case of migrant workers in Saudi Arabia, as they accounted for the great majority of workers in the country. The situation of migrant workers was a matter of concern in the country. The Government therefore needed to make every effort to provide, in its report to the Committee of Experts, detailed information on: violations concerning migrant workers employed by their employers in occupations other than those specified in their work permits; migrant workers engaged by other employers; delays in the payment of wages; the absence of enterprise rules; the non-recruitment of Saudi nationals to the positions reserved for them by law; and the violations of the regulations on occupational safety and health.

The Employer members stated that this was a technical case concerning the reporting requirements under the Convention. It was clear that without an effective and efficient labour inspectorate, there could be no effective implementation of employment and labour laws. They were pleased to hear from the Government concerning the number of different improvements in its labour inspection system, including increasing the number of labour inspectors, drawing up new inspection forms and making good use of the Internet. The first point raised by the Committee of Experts related to the Government’s failure to include in the annual report of the labour inspectorate statistical data, as required under the Convention. The submitted written information fulfilled that requirement, from what they could ascertain, but it remained up to the Committee of Experts to make that determination. They agreed with the Worker members that the issue of migrant workers was very important in that region of the world, and understood that the labour inspection situation for these workers was critical. The Committee of Experts had also commented on the inspections done by other Government agencies, and therefore getting a fuller picture of that process would be vital to obtaining a complete understanding of the labour inspection system. They urged the Government to provide all information that it had not yet submitted with respect to its labour inspection system.

The Government member of Egypt took note of the information provided by the Government and noted the collaboration which it was maintaining with the ILO. Noting the lack of statistical information in the annual labour inspection report, he considered that such information would be very useful for verifying the effectiveness of inspection activities. He indicated that the Government was taking positive measures, for example, the recruitment of 1,000 new inspectors, the use of new methods and the establishment of databases which would result in better compliance with the Convention. He said that it would be appropriate for the ILO Regional Office in Beirut to offer technical assistance to the country.

The Worker member of France emphasized that the statistical information on labour legislation infringements and penalties imposed were key in evaluating the degree of observance of the Convention. The lack of statistics suggested that inspections could not go ahead freely in enterprises and that employees who were the victims of abuse in the employment relationship could not talk freely to labour inspectors, who themselves faced problems in relation to reporting. However, as the Committee of Experts had noted, such data appeared to exist since the Government’s website contained information on infringements concerning migrant workers. The Government should therefore include such data in its next report. The Conference Committee should urge the Government to take the necessary steps, in observance of social dialogue and freedom of expression, to ensure the functioning of an inspection system that was in conformity with the provisions of the Convention. That required an adequate number of inspectors and an inspection system which operated in full independence and had the freedom to monitor and report the results of infringements that it had recorded.

The Worker member of Nepal joined his colleagues in expressing concern over the failure of the Government of Saudi Arabia to comply with the Convention, and expressed his concern over the lack of adequate labour inspection to protect the rights of workers in the country, especially migrant workers. Many workers from his country travelled to Saudi Arabia annually in search of work and prosperity, and over 200,000 currently worked there, included among the six million migrant workers from all over the world. Many of these workers were taken advantage of by private employment agencies that promised decent wages and conditions of work but, in fact, provided only a fraction of that promise to the workers upon arrival. The employers in Saudi Arabia treated these workers badly, including forcing them to work long hours, paying them little to nothing, providing poor and unsafe working conditions, and preventing those who wished to leave by taking their passports. Those workers who escaped without their passports were not able to return home and lived in appalling conditions in shanty towns or detention centres. Women domestic workers were particularly vulnerable to poor treatment. Migrant workers were made much more vulnerable because of the sponsorship system (kafala), under which workers were much less likely to complain or seek redress for violations of their rights and could not leave the employer and seek other work. He was concerned that the Government was not fulfilling its responsibilities under the Convention, as it had not provided enough information to assess the situation properly. He was also concerned that many labour inspectors were tasked to enforce migration laws rather than protecting workers, as required under the Convention. The Government needed to provide the Committee of Experts and the Conference Committee with much more information on its labour inspection system so that a proper assessment could be made of compliance with the Convention. Finally, he called upon the Government to indicate if and how workers, including migrant and domestic workers, were informed of their rights and of the means to enforce those rights.

The Worker member of the United Kingdom, referring to the Committee of Experts’ observation regarding the Government’s failure to provide detailed information on the work of the labour inspectorate, stated that the data to be provided by the Government should include information about the labour inspectors’ powers to enter the workplace, to examine compliance and to enforce sanctions. She also indicated that more statistics were required on the number of inspection visits that had been carried out, the nature of violations observed and the penalties imposed. Such information should be broken down by nationality, gender and occupation of the workers, and the size of the workplace. She stressed that in the case of Saudi Arabia it was absolutely critical that this data was provided since according to accounts of non-governmental organizations (NGOs) and the workers themselves, the labour inspectorate had been unsuccessful in ensuring widespread compliance. The Government had to explain how, despite the activities of the labour inspectorate, there remained extensive reports of workers, in particular migrant workers, who were kept suspended from proper employment status under a sponsorship system, and who lived and worked in terrible conditions. There were reports of domestic workers working 20 hours per day and suffering violent beatings and sexual abuse or of construction workers who were forced to work extreme long hours, and whose safety was of little interest to their employers. Certain NGOs also feared that the labour inspectorate might be more interested in controlling migration than ensuring workers’ rights. She added that while the Government might claim that these allegations were fictional or isolated incidents, a number of governments had taken the matter extremely seriously, for instance, the Overseas Workers’ Affairs section of the House of Representatives of the Philippines had sent a fact-finding mission, the Indonesian regions of West Nusa Tenggara and West Java had placed bans on the recruitment of domestic workers, and Sri Lanka, Nepal and India had also considered restrictions on the supply of women domestic workers. In these circumstances, the speaker called upon the Government to provide, at its earliest opportunity, detailed information to the ILO and to avail itself of ILO technical assistance so as to assess gaps in law and implementation and ensure compliance with the Convention, in particular with respect to migrant workers.

The Government representative stated that national legislation, in its entirety, prohibited all practices that ran counter to the law. If such actions previously discussed had taken place, they constituted clear infringements of the law and they needed to be detected by the labour inspectorate. He reaffirmed the Government’s determination to implement the Convention and combat all forms of violations to its provisions, in particular those concerning migrant workers. He reaffirmed that the Government would do its utmost to prevent violations, including those with respect to migrant workers. Problems could arise in this respect. Certain practices had been identified, and the Government needed to take measures to prevent such violations. While he thanked the speakers who had participated in the discussion for their comments, he noted that the Government had not received any reports from countries that had sent migrant workers to Saudi Arabia. He admitted that certain practices of an illegal nature had occurred, but those were few in number and the Government would do its utmost to eliminate them. He understood that the fears expressed by the Worker members were genuine, which was why the Government was adopting new legislation, such as the Code on the protection of wages, to end certain processes. The Government had undertaken measures to protect wages directly paid to workers in cooperation with the Emirates to ensure that those practices were applied throughout the Kingdom and covered all forms of workers, including domestic workers. It had revised the system for transfer of funds so that workers could make those transfers via banks. In addition, the Government had just adopted a list of employment agencies that negotiated contracts and provided services to employees. The Government would continue making efforts in this area and would identify practices that ran counter to laws, humanitarian principles and the religion of Islam. Finally, he thanked the Government representative of Egypt, in particular his proposal that through the ILO Office in Beirut his Government would enhance cooperation and train officials in the collection and presentation of statistics.

The Worker members noted that the Government representative’s statement gave reason to hope for full application of the Convention. Implementation of the Convention enabled Saudi Arabia to keep track of developments in the labour market and the application of labour legislation. The Worker members emphasized that migrant workers were an important part of the workforce and it was therefore crucial that inspectors verified whether labour legislation was being applied effectively. The Government should supply detailed information in its next report, as it had undertaken to do.

Conclusions

The Committee took note of the statement made by the Government representative and the discussion that followed. The Committee noted that the issues raised by the Committee of Experts concerned the absence of statistical information in the annual labour inspection report, which made it impossible to evaluate the level of compliance with the Convention in practice.

The Committee took note of the statement made by the Government representative, who had emphasized that, according to the Committee of Experts, the national law was in full compliance with the Convention and had described the steps taken by the Government to enhance the efficiency, effectiveness and coverage of the labour inspection system, including through the assignment of 1,000 new inspection posts and the development of a unified electronic database to ensure detailed statistics on the improvements made in the working environment and the higher rates of compliance achieved with the applicable legislation and international labour standards. The Committee also took note of the statistical information provided by the Government representative, both orally and in writing, demonstrating a recent increase in inspection visits, the numbers of inspectors and the fines imposed under articles 13, 25, 33, 38 and 39 of the Labour Law. It noted the indication by the Government of its commitment to continuously improve the labour inspection system, in cooperation with the ILO, so as to effectively monitor the working environment and improve the working conditions of all workers, including migrant workers, and ensure their effective protection against any unacceptable practices.

The Committee emphasized the importance of an effective system of labour inspection in ensuring the effective implementation of labour laws. It noted that the statistical information requested under Article 21 of the Convention was very important to enable an objective evaluation of the extent to which the legal provisions relating to conditions of work and the protection of workers while engaged in their work were being respected, as required by Articles 2 and 3 of the Convention. The Committee emphasized in particular the importance of statistical information on the terms and conditions of work of migrant workers in view of the predominance of migrant workers in the labour market in Saudi Arabia. Drawing the Government’s attention to the vulnerability of migrant workers, especially female domestic workers, the Committee called on the Government to redouble its efforts to ensure that the labour inspectorate was able to guarantee, through both promotional and enforcement action, that the rights of migrant workers were being effectively protected. The Committee requested the Government to transmit to the ILO detailed and gender disaggregated data on all the items listed in Article 21 of the Convention, including the number of infringements reported to the competent authorities, the violations detected and the number of convictions and the penalties imposed, classified according to the legal provisions to which they related, with special reference to migrant workers, as well as statistics of the workplaces liable to labour inspection and the number of workers employed therein. It also requested the Government to furnish information on the joint inspection activities carried out by the labour inspection service with other government agencies so as to provide a complete picture of the labour inspection system, its activities and impact.

The Committee also invited the Government to avail itself of the technical assistance of the ILO under the Plan of Action for the Promotion of the Ratification and Effective Implementation of the Governance Conventions, in cooperation with the ILO Office in Beirut.