At the beginning of July 2019, the government of Sri Lanka introduced a bill for a new unified employment law, known as the Single Labour Law, for the consideration of the tripartite National Labour Advisory Council. The aim was to change and replace the numerous existing labour laws. The bill was drafted without the involvement of trade unions.
When the unions finally got to see the bill, they discovered that the proposed changes largely affected private sector workers, in many ways undermining their rights.
Anton Marcus, leader of the Free Trade Zones and General Services Employees Union (FTZ&GSEU) described the bill as an unprecedented attack on workers’ rights, and warned that “Proposed changes will affect basic working conditions of around eight million private sector workers and will make the eight-hour limit working day a thing of the past.” He noted that the new proposal provided the employer with the right to decide on working conditions, making workers defenceless and vulnerable to the whim of the employers. The scrapping of the Wages Board, for example, placed the right to decide the minimum wage in the hands of the employer.
On 21 August, the trade unions held a massive protest demonstration in Colombo in front of the labour ministry demanding the withdrawal of the bill.
