Direct Request (CEACR) - adopted 2013, published 103rd ILC session (2014)

Part-Time Work Convention, 1994 (No. 175) - Mauritius (Ratification: 1996)

Article 7 of the Convention. Equivalent conditions for part-time workers with respect to termination benefits, annual leave and sick leave. Further to its previous comment, the Committee notes the Government’s explanations that part-time workers benefit from the severance allowance provided for in section 46(9) of the Employment Rights Act (i.e. payment of one quarter of a month’s remuneration for every period of 12 months) because they are excluded from the benefits of the Workfare programme set up under Part IX of the Act. The Committee notes, however, that full-time workers are entitled to either a severance allowance equal to three months’ remuneration for every period of 12 months of employment or a transition unemployment benefit under the Workfare programme of at least 3,000 Mauritian rupees per month for up to 12 months. The Committee recalls, in this regard, that Article 7 of the Convention requires measures to ensure that part-time workers receive conditions equivalent (i.e. not necessarily identical provided that they ensure not less favourable treatment) to those of full-time workers in respect of termination benefits. The Committee accordingly requests the Government to: (i) provide additional information on the reasons for excluding part-time workers from the Workfare programme; and (ii) explain how the considerably more favourable treatment afforded to full-time workers with respect to termination benefits may be qualified as “equivalent conditions” within the meaning of Article 7 of the Convention.