Labour policy is a legislation that is used to protect the workforce in their respective workplaces. It is to safeguard the workers in matters of working conditions, working duration, working safety, working benefits.
Labours have a vital role to play in increasing the productivity of any organisation. Hence ensuring they are taken care of and safeguarded in all aspects is the main objective to create labour laws and policies.
The term Labour Law is used to denote that body of laws which deal with employment and non-employment, wages, working conditions, industrial relations, social security and labour welfare of industrially employed, persons.
Why is labour policy needed
1. To understand and analyse the labour issue.
2. To examine the challenges faced by labours in a globalising economy.
3. To create new labour laws where need be.
4. To ensure the relationship between employers and employees is partnership-based and focuses on increasing productivity and building the national economy.
5. To protect and ensure the overall well-being of an employee and to secure their due shares in an economic gain.
What does the current labour policies include:-
1. Creative measures to attract public and private investment.
2. Creating new jobs with social security schemes for labours.
3. Unified and beneficial management of welfare funds.
4. Model employee-employer relationship with long term settlements.
5. Reprioritisation of allocation of funds to benefit vulnerable workers.
6. Declare vital industries and establishments as public utilities.
7. Labour Law reforms in tune with the changing times.
There are certain fundamental principles on which the labour policy is based on, these include:-
1. Social Equity — everyone is equal and everyone has to be given equal rights.
2. Social Justice — equal distribution of benefits and affording workers wellbeing.
3. International uniformity — to maintain uniformity with labour laws globally.
4. National economy — to ensure that the contributions of both the employer and employee lead towards building the economy.
Thus as we can see, labour policy is a very essential requirement to maintain proper decorum and discipline in any organisation. In other words, it’s a policy that is used to avoid any kind of exploitation. It is a policy to ensure the hiring company is at an advantage as it’s productivity is increasing and at the same time, the employee is duly compensated without compromising on their well-being. Thus it is very important for all companies to follow the labour laws and policies.
Deepa's blog 