On Wednesday, March 2, with the participation of the Chairman of the Federation of Trade Unions of the Republic of Kazakhstan Satybalda Dauletalin, an expanded meeting of the Coordinating Council of the Territorial Association of Trade Unions of the Kyzylorda region was held.
Currently, the Trade Union Center of the Kyzylorda region unites 1018 primary trade union organizations with the number of 101,632 trade union members. There are branches of 12 branch trade unions in the region. In 2021, 19 new primary trade union organizations were created, and the number of trade union members increased by 837 people.
Welcoming the participants of the meeting, the chairman of the Territorial Association of Trade Unions of the Kyzylorda region, Maksut Nalibayev, summed up the main results of the activities of trade union organizations in the region for 2021.
Speaking about the development of social partnership, the head of the Trade Union Center said that the relationship between social partners in the region is being implemented within the framework of the trilateral regional agreement on social partnership and regulation of social and labor relations for 2021-2023.
In 2021, 5 meetings of the regional tripartite commission were held under the chairmanship of the chairman of the Trade Union Center, including 3 meetings held at the trade union site. The practice of holding field meetings of the regional tripartite commission in the districts has begun. At the initiative of the trade unions, they consider situations at enterprises at risk of labor disputes: issues of raising wages, expanding the coverage of collective agreements of labor collectives and specific measures to prevent occupational injuries.
According to the Professional Center, collective agreements are valid in 5828 enterprises and organizations in the region, which is 70% of the total number of enterprises operating in the region.
On the recommendation of trade unions, the qualitative indicator of the content of collective agreements will affect the efficiency coefficient of the akims of cities and districts, the chairman of the Trade Union Center said.
In the field of view of trade unions, a special place is occupied by the issues of preventing occupational injuries, ensuring safe working conditions. The program “Safe work” has been adopted in the Kyzylorda region. In organizations and enterprises of the region where there are trade unions, there are 736 industrial councils for labor protection and 758 technical inspectors. 33 enterprises have adopted the Vision Zero program proposed by the International Labor Organization, which provides for the principle of “zero injuries”, and 8 enterprises are implementing the trade union project “People’s Control”.
According to the Trade Union Center, in 2021, 42 industrial accidents occurred in the region, 60 workers were injured, 14 of them died. For the most part, the construction industry remains the most traumatic (8 fatal accidents). Trade unions call the main causes of occupational injuries not ensuring safe working conditions by employers.
Often, the absence or improper attitude to labor safety issues, low wages, lack of social guarantees from the employer, unfair personnel policy become a reason for social tension in labor collectives, the Trade Union Center notes. Therefore, the Territorial Association of Trade Unions conducts daily monitoring of the situation at enterprises. Topical issues of labor collectives of 4 out of 5 Kyzylorda enterprises included in the risk map for labor conflicts were resolved after consideration at meetings of the regional tripartite commission.
“As a result of the joint work of social partners, discussions of the parties at several negotiating platforms, the demands of the employees of the Aidan-Munai SNPS for a salary increase were met, and from February 1, 2022, their wages increased by 50%. Since the beginning of 2021, employees of KuatAmlonMunai JV LLP have demanded an increase in wages and the provision of social assistance provided for by the collective agreement. On December 22, 2021, 320 workers went on hunger strike to protest against the employer’s failure to comply with the requirements. This issue is still relevant, and negotiations are underway between the parties,” said Maksut Nalibayev, Chairman of the Trade Union Center.
The trade Union Center of the Kyzylorda region provides legal assistance to trade union members and not only on an ongoing basis. In total, in 2021, 927 appeals were received from citizens of the region to the Legal Clinic of the Professional Center, most of those who applied were provided with legal advice and appropriate recommendations were given.
According to Maksut Nalibayev, representatives of the Trade Union Center help employees of enterprises in lawsuits. The trade union center of the Kyzylorda region managed to defend the rights of 12 employees of the oil company “KazPetrolGroup”, dismissed in September 2021, for the initiative to create a trade union organization.
“In February of this year, the Kyzylorda City Court issued a decision on the restoration of employees with payment for the time of forced suspension from work. The court found that the grounds for termination of the employment contract, which the employer is guided by, is illegal, which violates the labor rights of citizens (paragraph 3 of Article 50 of the Labor Code of the Republic of Kazakhstan),” Maksut Nalibayev said.
The situation in the labor collectives of CNEC LLP, Araltuz JSC and Tuzkol-Munai Gas Operating LLC, where labor disputes have arisen, is stable, issues are under the close control of the Trade Center.
The Trade Union Center pays great attention to raising the legal awareness of trade union members. During the reporting period, 12 training seminars were held for 500 trade union members on the procedure for considering individual labor disputes in the conciliation commission, changes in the Labor Code. At the same time, the chief specialist of the territorial trade union, Mayra Boranbayeva, is a regular lecturer of training seminars of the Federation of Trade Unions of the Republic of Kazakhstan.
In the Year of the primary trade union organization, representatives of the Trade Union Center met with the labor collectives of 47 enterprises of the region as part of the Republican campaign “How are you, primary?”. This work will be continued this year.
The meeting of the Coordinating Council, along with the members of the Korsovet, was attended by the heads of primary trade union organizations. Bakytzhan Mukasheva, Chairman of the trade union organization of Petro Kazakhstan Kumkol Resources JSC, noted that the main urgent issue for Kyzylorda oil workers is the increase in wages.
“With the support of the Federation of Trade Unions, the Kyzylorda Trade Union Center, primary trade union organizations operate at seven oil enterprises in the region. However, we have not seen any support from the oil and gas industry trade union recently,” Bakhytzhan Mukasheva said.
The problem with low wages in the energy sector was shared by the chairman of the primary trade union organization of LLP “KyzylordaZhylElectroOrtalygy” Galymzhan Kairbergenov.
“Despite inflationary processes, the salary of power engineers has increased by only 5 percent. The wages of employees of the energy company are still the lowest, which in turn has caused staff turnover. If 92 employees left our industry in 2020, 115 people left last year. Seeing the wages of power engineers, young specialists do not go into the industry,” Galymzhan Kayrbergenov complained.
In turn, the chairman of the regional branch of the branch trade union of medical workers “Senim” Asylkhan Ablaikhanuly told about the activities of the branch of the medical trade union.
After listening to the Kyzylorda colleagues, the Chairman of the Federation of Trade Unions of the Republic of Kazakhstan Satybaldy Dauletalin noted that all problems leading to labor conflicts should first of all be considered and resolved at the primary level of social partnership – between the employer and employees, with the exception of those that are systemic in nature.
“One of the reasons for labor conflicts is that some employers do not engage in dialogue with employees, ignoring their demands. The Federation constantly poses this systemic issue to the social partners. The second reason is the low incomes of employees of enterprises. We have submitted to our social partners a proposal to amend the Labor Code on mandatory wage indexation. The third issue is the size of the minimum wage. Despite the fact that the minimum wage has increased this year, according to trade unions, it still remains below international standards. In this regard, we have made a proposal to ratify the 131 Convention of the International Labour Organization, according to which the minimum wage should be 50% of the average wage in the country. Fourth, at the government level, it is necessary to clarify the accrual of surcharges for tariff and discharge wage systems,” Satybaldy Dauletalin said.
According to the Chairman of the FTURK, for the effective development of the social partnership system, all three parties of the social partnership need to take a more responsible attitude, first of all, to work on the quality of the content of regional agreements. In some parts, the regional agreement is declarative. The reason for such declarativeness is the lack of equal sides of the partnership, in particular on the part of employers, says Satybaldy Dauletalin.
At the end of the meeting, the Chairman of the FTURK identified a number of specific tasks facing the professional asset of the Kyzylorda region.
“Firstly, it is necessary to continue working together with social partners to prevent labor conflicts at enterprises in the region. Secondly, to increase the coverage of trade union membership of employees of enterprises and organizations, and to provide all possible support to primary trade union organizations on topical organizational and legal issues is a daily job for a professional asset. Thirdly, professional activists need to intensify relations with employers on the qualitative content of collective agreements, their social orientation. Fourth, the Trade Union Center needs to initiate all the urgent problems of ordinary trade union members for consideration at the meetings of the regional trilateral commission and, together with social partners, find ways to solve them,” the Chairman of the FTURK stressed – “In the year of social partnership, trade union activists face the task of improving the welfare of every working person through strengthening relations with government agencies and employers,” concluded Satybaldy Dauletalin.
Media Center of the Federation of Trade Unions of the Republic of Kazakhstan