Vice Chairman of provincial People’s Committee Le Anh Duong speaks at the dialogue .

The event, which took place at the Dinh Tram Industrial Park (Viet Yen district), also saw the presence of Tran Van Lam, deputy head of the provincial National Assembly delegation and representatives from Bac Giang city, Viet Yen, Yen Dung, Lang Giang, Hiep Hoa and Yen The districts.

Many policy proposals raised

Le Van Huan, Chairman of the Trade Union of SungWoo Vina Co., Ltd at the Dinh Tram Industrial Park, questioned the regional wage adjustment plan in 2018 and expressed his concern over the impact of the Government’s constant minimum wage changes on businesses’ revenues. Similarly, many participants wondered how to calculate workers’ salary when it is lower than the minimum wage because businesses mainly pay wages by products.

Some opinions showed that procedures for transferring health insurance cards and enjoying allowances after leaving work are still cumbersome. Medical facilities where workers register initial check-ups in are yet to create favorable conditions for workers and enterprises. Documents guiding occupational safety and hygiene and stipulating criteria for unemployment benefits are not specific yet, confusing workers, businesses, and trade unionists at the grassroots level.

Concerning over kindergartens for workers’ children, Nguyen Van Tu, Deputy Director and Chairman of the Trade Union of the Bac Giang Garment Joint Stock Company, said many female workers at the company asked for unpaid leave to stay at home to take care of their children because they feel unsafe to send their kids to private kindergartens. Given the situation, he proposed authorities and competence agencies take measures to prevent violence against children and invest in infrastructure and human resources for this educational level, especially at worker-dense areas.

Than Van Kien, a representative from Crystal Martin Joint Stock Co., Ltd, reported the non-recruitment of male workers is taking place in most enterprises, causing the imbalance in labor supply and demand.

Others held that it is necessary to build cultural facilities for workers at industrial parks and clusters and organize culture-sport activities to improve their spiritual life.

Continue improving workers’ living standards

Fielding a question relating to social insurance, Than Duc Lai, Director of the provincial Social Security, highlighted policy changes in 2018. The interest rate when paying social and unemployment insurance premiums after schedule will be 1.3 percent per month while that for health insurance is 0.96 percent. The request for the company’s introduction paper when being hospitalized is due to increasing fake papers to enjoy benefits. In the coming time, the provincial Social Security will work with the provincial Health Department to reduce unnecessary procedures, he said.

Nguyen Van Canh, President of the provincial Labour Federation, said the payment of trade union fees is the obligation of business owners. This fund is used by grassroots trade unions to organize activities to take care of workers’ life. In August 2017, the provincial People’s Committee approved a plan to build a cultural facility for workers on an area of 10 hectares in Nenh town (Viet Yen district).

Vice Chairman of the provincial People’s Committee Le Anh Duong said the capacity of public preschools is still limited. To take better care of children of workers, he suggested the provincial Department of Education and Training and localities employ concrete measures to manage the operation of kindergartens and pay more attention to training teachers in order to increase their professional skills and ethics.

He urged the provincial Labour Federation to send to the grassroots-level trade unions documents on the management of their funds while learning experience from other provinces to reform culture-sport activities at industrial parks and clusters.

At the conference, the provincial Social Security, Department of Labour, Invalids and Social Affairs, and Labour Federation announced their hotlines to receive and clarify questions raised by workers, which are 02043526326, 02043529266, and 02043855437, respectively.

Do Quyen