Direct Request (CEACR) - adopted 2018, published 108th ILC session (2019)

Freedom of Association and Protection of the Right to Organise Convention, 1948 (No. 87) - Peru (Ratification: 1960)

The Committee notes the observations of the Autonomous Workers’ Confederation of Peru (CATP), received on 2 September 2018, on the right to strike in the public and private sectors. The Committee requests the Government to provide its comments with regard to these allegations.

Article 3 of the Convention. Rights of organizations to organize their activities and to formulate their programmes. Strikes by public servants. The Committee notes that section 81 of the General Regulations of the Civil Service Act adopted in 2014 prohibits atypical forms of strikes, such as staggered stoppages, labour slowdowns, go-slow strikes or working to rule, the deliberate reduction in performance or any type of action causing paralysis of work in which civil servants remain in the workplace and entrance to the workplace is obstructed. In this regard, the Committee recalled that any work stoppage, however brief and limited, may generally be considered as a strike and that the restrictions on strikes can only be justified if the strike ceases to be peaceful. Additionally, the Committee considered that strike pickets and workplace occupations should be permitted, provided that these actions unfold peacefully and with respect for freedom to work of non-striking workers and that the right of the management to enter the premises is guaranteed. Observing that the Government provides no information in this regard, the Committee once again requests it to engage in discussions with the trade unions with a view to revising this provision in the light of the abovementioned principles and to report on any steps taken in this respect.

Replacement of striking workers in the education sector. In its previous comments, the Committee requested the Government to take measures to clarify in Ministerial Decision No. 080-2007-ED, which provides for the establishment of the national register of supply teachers for regular basic education, in which situations striking workers may be replaced. The Committee also noted the Government’s indication that the Ministerial Decision had been supplemented by the Regulations to Act No. 28988 which set out regular basic education as an essential public service (Supreme Decree No. 017-2007-ED) and that, in accordance with section 4 of those Regulations, the national register of supply teachers may only be used in the event of unlawful strikes, one ground of unlawfulness being the failure to ensure minimum services. The Committee nevertheless noted that section 3 of the Regulations prohibits any form of stoppage of education services by a unilateral decision of the staff mentioned, regardless of the reason invoked, the term used for the strike and the way it is carried out. Observing that the Government provides no information in this regard, the Committee requests it once again to engage in consultations with the relevant trade unions, with a view to revising the abovementioned Regulations to clarify in which situations striking workers may be replaced and to ensure that such replacement may only take place in the event of strikes that are declared unlawful in conformity with the Convention.