Dominica

Organization responsible for the statistics

The Labour Division, Ministry of Legal Affairs, Immigration and Labour is responsible for collecting and compiling information on strikes. This information is published by the Central Statistical Division, Ministry of Finance.

Objectives and users

Not available.

Coverage

Strikes and lockouts

The statistics cover:

Minimum threshold duration of at least one hour.

Economic activities

No particular branches of economic activity or sectors are excluded.

Workers

Workers directly involved only. As well as regular paid employees, including part/time workers, the statistics cover temporary, casual and seasonal workers. Not included are those laid off, or workers absent on sick or annual leave or absent for any other reason.

No particular occupational groups are excluded from the statistics.

Geographic areas

Whole country.

Types of data collected

Concepts and definitions

Strike

A cessation of work or a refusal to work or to continue to work by employees in combination or in concert or in accordance with a common understanding; and a slow-down of work or other concerted activity on the part of employees in relation to their work that is designed to restrict or limit output, including action commonly known as sit-down strike, a go-slow or a sick-out.

Lockout

The closing of a place of employment, a suspension of work by an employer or a refusal by an employer to employ a number of his employees, done to compel his employees, or to aid another employer or to compel his employee, to agree to terms and conditions of employment.

The definitions come from Dominica's Labour Laws and from the publication by Beatrice and Sidney Webb: The History of Trade Unionism.

Methods of measurement

Strikes and lockouts

The economic unit is the basic unit of measurement used to record a strike or lockout. An action interrupted but later resumed, still due to the same case of dispute, is treated as a new action.

Actions resulting from the same case of dispute and occurring simultaneously in different establishments of the same firm or enterprise are considered as one. Those occurring simultaneously in establishments of different firms or enterprises are counted separately. Any strikes or lockouts, occurring for the same case of dispute at different times, are recorded and counted separately.

Economic units involved

The economic unit is the business or establishment, also identified as the trade, undertaking or enterprise.

Workers involved

Workers involved are counted as the number of absentees on a daily or hourly basis for the duration of the stoppage. Part-time workers are counted as individuals on the same basis as full-time workers.

Duration

Duration is measured in terms of actual working days from the date the stoppage began to the date it terminated in one particular economic unit.

Time not worked

Total time not worked is measured in both workdays and workhours by ascertaining the total amount of time not worked on each day of the stoppage and summing these totals. The shorter working hours of part-time workers are taken into account. Overtime is not taken into account.

Classifications

None.

Reference period and periodicity

The statistics are compiled and published for periods of one year. They relate to strikes beginning during the particular reference period only.

Analytical measures

None.

Historical background of the series

Not available.

Documentation

Series available

Not available.

Bibliographic references

Labour Commissioner: Annual Report.

Data published by the ILO

The number of strikes and lockouts, the number of workers involved and the number of days not worked, by economic activity.

Confidentiality

Not available.

International standards

Not available.

Methods of data collection

Any party taking strike action (i.e. the trade union or the employer) is legally obliged to report the following information to the Minister for Legal Affairs, Immigration and Labour, giving 14 days' notice: