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The Committee notes the Government’s reports for the period ending May 1999 and the attached documents. It also notes the information available at the ILO on the progress of the establishment and completion of certain phases of the project for the modernization of labour administration in Central America with ILO cooperation (project MATAC-ILO). This shows significant progress in regard to the organization of the labour administration system, including the organization of a labour inspection system placed under the coordination of a central directorate of the Secretariat of State for Labour. The Committee notes in particular with satisfaction that Executive Decree No. 75-99 under which Act No. 1491 of 1992 regarding the civil service and administrative careers now extends to the staff of the Secretariat of State for Labour as this measure gives labour inspectors the status of public officials, in accordance with Article 6 of the Convention. The Committee considers, in fact, that this is one of the essential conditions for application of the Convention in that it gives inspectors the necessary authority and impartiality in their relations with employers and workers. The Committee expresses the hope that the reorganization of the inspection system along with the enhancement of the status of labour inspection staff will be paralleled by an evolution, in the framework or as a result of the MATAC-ILO project, of labour legislation in accordance with the purposes of the Convention. In this regard, it emphasizes the need to give a legal basis to the powers of inspectors as laid down particularly in Article 12(1)(a) and (b), which the Government states exists in practice, and by Article 18 for which difficulties of application result, according to a preliminary study conducted in 1991 by the Inter-American Labour Administration Centre, from inadequate cooperation from the judicial authorities in pursuing offenders against labour legislation as well as the derisory nature of the fines imposed. The Committee would be grateful if the Government would supply regular information regarding progress in the activities undertaken to improve the effectiveness of the labour inspection system and their impact on application of the Convention in regard to the abovementioned provisions and the points raised in previous comments.