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The Committee notes with regret that the Government’s report does not reply to its previous comments on the following points.

The Committee has been referring for a number of years to the need to amend legislation so that restrictions on the right to strike would only be imposed in the case of essential services, meaning the services the interruption of which would endanger the life, personal safety or health of the whole or part of the population, or in case of an acute national crisis. The Committee had noted that the banana, citrus and coconut industries, as well as the port authority, were included in the schedule of essential services annexed to Act No. 18 of 1986 on industrial relations, making it possible to stop a strike by compulsory arbitration, and that sections 59(1)(b) and 61(1)(c) of this Act empowered the Minister to refer disputes to compulsory arbitration if in his or her opinion it concerned serious issues.

In this respect, the Committee draws the Government’s attention to paragraph 160 of its 1994 General Survey on freedom of association and collective bargaining wherein it states that, in order to avoid damages which are irreversible or out of all proportion to the occupational interests of the parties to the dispute, as well as damages to third parties, the authorities could establish a system of minimum service in other services which are of public utility, like the port authority, rather than impose an outright ban on strikes, which would be limited to essential services in the strict sense of the term.

The Committee urges the Government once again to take the necessary measures in the very near future to ensure that strikes may only be prohibited in essential services in the strict sense of the term, in conformity with Article 3 of the Convention. It draws the Government’s attention to the availability of the technical assistance of the Office in this respect should it so desire.