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 Trade unions have traditionally been among the pioneers in the movement to prevent and eliminate child labour, and in many countries, this continues to be the case today. In industries and enterprises where trade unions are present at the workplace, they can put pressure on management for the gradual elimination of child labour, or at least ensure they are not subject to hazardous or inhuman conditions of work. The worst forms of child labour are less likely to be found in the organized sector, where trade unions have most influence, and less in unionized than in union-free plants.
Beyond direct action at the workplace, trade unions contribute to the battle against the worst forms of child labour by:
- awareness-raising among their members and among all adult workers through publicity, posters and other campaigns, workshops and educational events. They are also well placed to have influence over the attitudes of workers' families, the children and their parents, and join forces with others, such as employers' organizations, consumers' organizations and NGOs in conducting anti-child labour campaigns;
- monitoring the development of child labour, often in cooperation with government services and employers' organizations, and collecting local and national-level data, which are necessary to identify where the worst forms of child labour are to be found, and for the evaluation of programmes to combat them;
- engaging in collective bargaining with employers about ways to avoid and eliminate child labour;
- participating in tripartite discussions with governments and employers' organizations in defining policies and programmes to combat the worst forms of child labour and in monitoring their implementation;
- providing direct assistance to working children and their parents
- playing a watchdog role in bringing abuses to light;
- establishing structures,e.g. focal points, units and committees within their organ-ization;
- participating in national programmes and institutions to combat child labour;
- in cases of persistent violations, utilizing the supervisory machinery of inter-national instruments.
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Trade Unions' good practices
The Bangladesh Building and Woodworkers' Federation provides 300 working children with access to government-sponsored schools and a food-for-education programme. It also raises awareness among construction workers, trade unionists and parents of working children about the hazards of child labour and the advantages of education.
The Trade Union Congress of the Philippines assisted three NGOs in helping abused child domestic workers. When a telephone help line identified a serious problem, trade union lawyers assisted in removing the children from their employers' homes.
The Rural Workers' Union of Petrolina in Brazil organized help for child agricultural labourers who were working long hours and handling hazardous agrochemicals. These children were removed from work, given complementary education and, together with their parents, were introduced to horticultural skills.
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In spite of the essential role that they have to play, it has to be acknowledged that trade unions are sometimes unable to be major contributors to action against child labour. In some countries, their members are not motivated or sympathetic to the cause. In others, child labour is not among their highest priorities. Many trade unions are too short of funds to undertake any activities in this area. Some face restrictions on their right to organize and engage in collective bargaining. And generally the growth of non-organized forms of labour - the informal sector, and increased use of sub-contracting and home-working, has presented a challenge to trade unions.
By demonstrating some concern for the growth of child labour in these sectors and by offering some constructive solutions to the problem, they could perhaps enhance their prestige and their influence among the hitherto unorganized.
Further reading: ILO Bureau for Workers' Activities,
Trade Unions and Child Labour - Children out of work and into school, adults into work, Geneva, 2001.
Teachers
That teachers have a central role to play in action against child labour scarcely needs emphasizing. The importance of their role lies not only in providing children with basic skills and education:
- they should foster in children the desire to learn and develop;
- they can help children (as well as their parents) to know about their rights, and motivate them to stay at school rather than be drawn into undesirable forms of labour, which will impede their development in later life;
- they are key partners for local authorities in identifying cases of child labour; they can inform them when a child is no longer at school, or when a child is engaged in work - sometimes quite arduous and hazardous work - which is occurring parallel to schooling and is greatly impairing his or her ability to learn;
- they have a major contribution to make to ensure that the education provided to children is of good quality and relevant to the needs and situations of the children, their parents and the communities in which they live;
- they can influence national educational policies, programmes and budgets;
- they can raise awareness on the importance of education and training as alternativesto child labour.
Public authorities can help to motivate teachers to play these roles. The quality of the education they provide and of the support they give to children and their parents depends on the training that teachers receive and on their conditions of employment (as well, of course, as on the quality and availability of school infrastructure, facilities and equipment). The recruitment, training and motivation of sufficient teachers must be among the highest priorities in any programme against child labour.
Child labour undermines the bargaining power of trade unions. Working children represent a plentiful source of cheap labour. This contributes to the depression of wages and leads to the weakening of trade unions' ability to negotiate improvements in workers' wages and conditions of service. Workers' organizations are logical leaders in discovering and fighting child labour at the local, national and international level. Trade unions can and must assert the right of workers to adequate remuneration, reducing poor families ' dependency on child labour. Workers' organizations have access to large numbers of adult workers and their families. Trade unions have a role to play in collective bargaining and in social mobilization efforts at the national and international levels.
The ACTRAV project "Developing National and International Trade Union Strategies to Combat Child Labour" has as its main objective to strengthen the ability of trade union organizations to start the process of developing trade union policy and action plans to combat child labour.
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