Labour Standards
Principle 3:
Businesses should uphold the freedom of association and the effective recognition of the right to collective bargaining.
Principle 4:
Businesses should uphold the elimination of forced or compulsory labour.
Principle 5:
Businesses should uphold the abolition of child labour.
Principle 6:
Businesses should uphold the elimination of discrimination in respect of employment and occupation.
"The best anti-poverty programme is employment, and the best road to economic empowerment and social well-being lies in decent work."
UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan, December 2005
These Principles are drawn from the ILO’s Declaration of Fundamental Principles and Rights at Work (1998).
In the next pages reference may be made to relevant ILO’s Conventions which also express these principles. States that ratify ILO Conventions then generally work to bring their national law and practice into line. While national laws are compulsory, the Global Compact framework is meant to promote values and inspire companies to move towards the realization of the principles.
Decent work - the heart of social progress
The text below, taken from www.ilo.org/public/english/decent.htm, provides a snapshot of the conditions and processes for change the ILO and the Global Compact Labour Principles seek to foster.
"The best anti-poverty programme is employment, and the best road to economic empowerment and social well-being lies in decent work."
ILO Director-General Juan Somavia
- Decent work sums up the aspirations of people in their working lives. It involves opportunities for work that is productive and delivers a fair income, security in the workplace and social protection for families, better prospects for personal development and social integration, freedom for people to express their concerns, organize and participate in the decisions that affect their lives and equality of opportunity and treatment for all women and men.
- Decent work should be at the heart of global, national and local strategies for economic and social progress. It is central to efforts to reduce poverty, and a means for achieving equitable, inclusive and sustainable development. The ILO works to promote decent work through its work on employment, social protection, standards and fundamental principles and rights at work and social dialogue.
- In each of these areas, people throughout the world face deficits, gaps and exclusions in the form of unemployment and underemployment, poor quality and unproductive jobs, unsafe work and insecure income, rights which are denied, gender inequality, migrant workers who are exploited, lack of representation and voice, and inadequate protection and solidarity in the face of disease, disability and old age. ILO programmes aim to find solutions to these problems.
- Progress towards decent work calls for action at the global level, mobilizing the principal actors of the multilateral system and the global economy around this agenda. At the national level, integrated decent work country programmes, developed by ILO constituents, define the priorities and the targets within national development frameworks. The ILO, working in partnership with others within and beyond the UN family, provides in-depth expertise and key policy instruments for the design and implementation of these programmes, for the building of institutions to carry them forward, and for the measurement of progress.