Minimum wage: Brick kiln owners threaten lock-out

Warn enforcement of law would leave millions jobless.

FAISALABAD:

More than 600 brick kiln owners on Wednesday threatened to shut down their kilns if forced to pay their workers Rs740 for making 1,000 bricks, the minimum wage notified by the government.

The district coordination officer later on Wednesday called a meeting with brick kiln workers associations and after negotiations agreed with their point of view. He assured the workers that the government would take action against the brick kiln owners who did not pay their workers fair wages.



Following province-wide protest demonstrations by brick kiln workers’ associations demanding that brick kiln owners pay them the rate specified in the Punjab Gazette 2013, the brick kiln owners have announced their own series of protests.

The kiln owners called a meeting on Wednesday to discuss a protest strategy and more than 600 owners and their representatives attended.

Brick Kiln Owners’ Association divisional president Haji Muhammad Islam said the government had fixed wages at Rs740 per 1,000 bricks without hearing them first. “We already pay Rs600 for 1,000 bricks...the new rate is not acceptable at all.”

He said if the government forced the new rate on them, they would shut down their kilns causing a wave of unemployment in the province.

Brick Kiln Owners’ Association district president Chaudhry Abdur Razzaq said most brick kiln workers were willing to work for Rs600 per 1,000 bricks, “but these labour groups are trying to turn them against us by promising them better wages”.

He said if the government did not withdraw the notification of the new rate and clamped down on labour groups, “we will be forced to shut down depriving millions of brick kiln workers of their livelihoods”.

He said the government must take all stakeholders into confidence before issuing such notifications.

Labour Qaumi Movement central secretary general Aslam Meraj told the media on Wednesday that the government had issued a notification in this regard, but the kiln owners had refused to respect it. “Not a single brick kiln house is paying its workers Rs740 for 1,000 bricks. We have complained to the government and the Labour Department to no avail,” he said.

The LQM has launched a series of protests, he said.

Published in The Express Tribune, March 6^th, 2014.