GENEVA (ILO News) - The Director-General of the International Labour Office (ILO) Juan Somavia flies to Ottawa on 14 October to urge Canada and other countries of the Americas to confront growing human insecurity in the work place, caused by the worldwide economic slowdown.
This insecurity has intensified since the terrorist attacks of 11 September targeted people at work in New York and Washington and, as Mr. Somavia has stated, "Unemployment, layoffs and lack of social protection has underpinned a deep human insecurity about the future."
The horrific events in the United States have given a new dimension to international policy coherence and it is time for creative thinking and action to improve the outlook for workers everywhere, Mr. Somavia says.
In Canada, which like other countries has not escaped the September 11 fallout in the job market, Mr. Somavia will meet the Minister of Labour, Ms. Claudette Bradshaw, and the Deputy Minister of Human Resources, Claire Morris on 15 October.
Mr. Somavia flies to Toronto 16 October for a roundtable meeting with the Canadian Employers Council and will return to Ottawa for a similar function and dinner with the Canadian Labour Congress. On 17 October, he will hold further talks with trade unionists and also meet members of the Subcommittee on International Trade, Trade Disputes and Investments Unit on Parliament Hill.
The ILO leader will address the opening session 18 October of the XII Inter-American Conference of Labour Ministers at the Government Conference Centre in Ottawa. That evening, Mr. Somavia leaves for talks in New York and Washington.
Mr. Somavia has pointed out that signs of insecurity, social exclusion and poverty are all too evident across the hemisphere, particularly in Latin America where more than 40 per cent of the people live in poverty - half of them in extreme poverty. Poverty levels today are higher than in the early 1980's.
The International Labour Organization is confronting this problem with its "Decent Work" agenda which calls for men and women to have productive work in conditions of freedom, security, equity and human dignity.
An important part of this agenda is the promotion of the ILO Declaration on Fundamental Principles and Rights at Work , the core conventions of which outlaw the worst forms of child labour, forced labour, discrimination in the work place, to guarantee workers' rights to freedom of association and to collective bargaining. Canada still has to ratify ILO Convention No. 98, which deals with this issue.
Mr. Somavia has stressed that progress toward Decent Work for All "is not just a matter of social policies or the responsibilities of social and labour government ministries." Economic and social policies must work in harness and, in the world of globalization, this requires greater economic and social policy coherence.
"Few have disagreed with this proposition," Mr. Somavia says.
The ILO's campaign for a Decent Work agenda will move into a new phase in Geneva 1 November with a three-day Global Employment Forum to develop a coordinated strategy on global employment. United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan will join Mr. Somavia and political, business and trade union leaders in seeking "realistic and sustainable" solutions to the urgent challenge facing the world today - quality jobs for everyone.
For more information, contact Michael Keats, Department of Communication: phone: +4122/799-6690.