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The Committee notes the Government's report.

The Committee recalls that for many years it has been pointing out a number of discrepancies between domestic legislation and the Convention, namely:

- section 34 of Act No. 107 of 1975 concerning trade unions, which provides protection against acts of discrimination for trade union activities during the employment relationship, but not at the time of the recruitment of a worker (Article 1 of the Convention);

- sections 63, 64, 65 and 67 of the Labour Code, which require the clauses of collective agreements to be in conformity with the economic interest (Article 4), whereas, in the Committee's opinion, rather than subjecting the validity of collective agreements to government approval, steps should be taken to persuade the parties to collective bargaining to have regard voluntarily to major economic and social policy considerations of general interest invoked by the Government;

- that public servants not engaged in the administration of the State, agricultural workers and seafarers do not have adequate protection against acts of anti-union discrimination or the right of collective bargaining.

The Committee had noted in its previous reports the assurance given by the Government that draft new labour legislation would apply ILO standards and observed that the National Commission that had been given the task of examining international labour Conventions had recommended that sections 4(d) and 34 of the Act of 1975, and sections 63, 64, 65 and 67 of the Labour Code be repealed or amended.

The Committee notes that the Government indicates in its last report only that a technical committee consisting of representatives of the Government, employers and workers considered that promulgation of Act No. 5 of 1991 on the Application of the Principles of the Great Green Book on human rights which provides that the citizens of the Jamahiriya shall be free to establish federations, unions, and occupational guilds to protect their occupational interests (section 6), and Act No. 20 of 1991 on the strengthening of freedom which contains similar provisions (sections 9 and 10), apply the Convention adequately.

Consequently, the Committee emphasizes once again the necessity of adopting measures to guarantee to all workers, be they nationals or foreigners, and not only to Libyan citizens, adequate protection against acts of anti-union discrimination at the time of recruitment, to secure the right to bargain collectively for public employees not engaged in the administration of the State, agricultural workers and seafarers, and to limit the scope of refusing official approval of collective agreements to questions of form or lack of conformity to the minimum standards of the Labour Code.

On the last point, the Committee draws the Government's attention to paragraphs 251 to 253 of its General Survey of 1994 on freedom of association and collective bargaining in which it indicates that in cases of economic difficulty the Government should prefer persuasion to constraint and that, in any event, the parties should be free to take their final decisions. In this study, the Committee highlighted certain suggestions on the question including the holding of prior consultations on what the scope of the concept of public interest should be, establishing joint bodies and drawing the attention of the parties to the economic policy objectives recognized as being in the general interest.

The Committee hopes that the Government will make every effort to take into account the suggestions made for amending its legislation and that it will supply information in its next report on any progress that has been achieved on these various points.