Category: Labour

Adjournment speech by DAP Member of Parliament for Bandar Melaka, Mr. Lim Kit Siang, at the Dewan Ra’ayat on Thursday, 9th December 1971

Contract labour system

The problem of contract labour in Malaysia has become so acute that is has forced the Minister of Labour to recently to take cognizance of it, and to state his concern over a tendency among some employers to replace permanent workers with contract labour under the guise of reorganisation of work-force and cutting costs. Continue reading Contract labour system

Press Statement by DAP Secretary-General and Member of Parliament for Bandar Melaka, Mr. Lim Kit Siang on 17th October 1971.

DAP calls on Minister of Labour to take swift and stern action against Killinghall Tin Mine for replacement of 147 permanent workers by contract labour

I welcome the speech by the Minister of Labour, Tan Sri V. Manickavasagam, to the National Mining Workers’ Union of Malaya during the weekend hitting out at employers who replace their staff with contract labour just to cut costs.

However, stronger action than speeches is needed. I have therefore today written to the Minister of Labour asking him to take swift and stern action against the Killinghall Tin Mine management in Puchong, Selangor, which retrenched 147 permanent workers on Oct. 1, and replaced them by cheaper contract labour to cut costs, even though workers who had worked for as long as 19 years were thrown out of work. Continue reading DAP calls on Minister of Labour to take swift and stern action against Killinghall Tin Mine

The Member of Parliament for Bandar Melaka, Mr Lim Kit Siang, today sent the following letter to the Editor, Malay Mail, Kuala Lumpur [17.8.71]

Copy

The Editor,
Malay Mail,
Kuala Lumpur

Sir,

My attention has just been drawn to a letter by a so-called labour leader, Mr S.J.H Zahidi, Secretary-General of the MTUC, in the Malay Mail of August 10, 1971.

Referring to my speeches in Parliament in the debates on the labour laws, Mr. Zaidi said that unlike the DAP, the MTUC “have never confused its national problems with the Government with those of its international obligations and responsibilities to Malaysia as a whole.” Continue reading A Letter to Malay Mail – Labour Law Issue

Speech by Sdr. Lim Kit Siang on the Trade Unions (Amendment) Bill 1971, in the Dewan Rakyat on July 26, 1971

Mr. Speaker, Sir, this is another piece of anti-labour legislation. The most “eye-catching” amendment is the provision banding trade union leaders from holding office in political parties. No other Act, I submit, of the Alliance Government has done more to show its mistrust and suspicion, even bordering on hatred, of the workers. Year in and year out the Government, through this Parliament, enacts more and more restrictive, oppressive and anti labour laws. The only way workers can undo all these anti-labour legislation is to send their leaders to this Parliament to battle for the legitimate rights of the workers, to release the workers from the bondage which the Government has condemned them to.

There was a time when trade unions and their leaders held the view that trade unions have nothing to do with politics. I am happy that this attitude has changed, because that belief was self- defeating and fallacious. For politics concerns every aspect of our life; whether it be cost of living, security of jobs, human and decent wages or human conditions of work. In Malaysia, workers have begun to realize that in a democratic country the only way to break the chains of these repressive, restrictive and anti-labour laws, which the Government has imposed on them, is to send their leaders to Parliament the supreme law-making body, to champion their rights and oppose the avaricious greed of those capitalists who will want even to squeeze blood from stone. Continue reading Trade Unions (Amendment) Bill 1971

The new labour amendments

The government’s amendments to the Emergency labour laws are a big farce. Under these amendments, the right and lot of the workers of Malaysia are even worse off than before the May 13 Emergency.

After May 13 Emergency, the Alliance Government passed sweeping restrictive labour laws to cripple the cause of labour. Such measures include:

1. Prohibition of trade union officials from holding office in political parties;

2. Denial of the right of dismissed employees to union representation and industrial action; and

3. Prohibiton of public sector employees from federating with private-sector workers.

The latest labour amendments leave these three restrictive measures intact. Continue reading The new labour amendments

Speech by DAP Secretary-General and Member of Parliament for Bandar Melaka, Mr.Lim Kit Siang, at the DAP Labour Bureau meeting on Wednesday, 4th Nov. 1970 at 8p.m. in Kuala Lumpur

For the past 18 months, the cause of labour in Malaysia suffered a series of setbacks.

Last year, the government prohibited officers of political parties from holding office in a trade union allegedly “to ensure that individual unions and the trade union movement shall be led by bona fide workers.”

This was followed by a barrage of blatantly anti-labour acts by the government, e.g. denying dismissed employees the right to union representation, the prohibition of public employees from federating with private –sector workers, the putting in cold storage of women’s equal pay issue and the salary claims of government employees, etc.. Continue reading Setbacks in Malaysian Labour

Speech by DAP Organising Secretary and Parliamentary Candidate for Bandar Melaka, Mr. Lim Kit Siang, at a tea party at Malacca DAP Branch, 103 Jalan Ujong Pasir, on 1st May, at 5.30p.m. to celebrate 1969 MAY DAY:

The DAP is a democratic socialist party, which seeks to end the exploitation of man by man and class by class. From the very first day of our formation, the DAP had fought for a better deal for workers.

In fact, one of the objects of the DAP, as spelt out in the DAP Constitution, states: “to abolish the injust inequalities of wealth and opportunities in the present system; to establish an economic order which will give all citizens the right to work and full economic returns for their labour and skill; to ensure decent living, and social security to all those who through sickness, infirmity or old age can no longer work.”

This was why the DAP Labour Bureau was formed to make a positive contribution towards the solution of labour problems in Malaysia.

The refusal of the alliance government to recognize MAY DAY as a national public holiday is proof of the anti-labour character of the Alliance. In progressive and enlightened countries, workers take a day off to rejoice at the dignity of labour, and to rededicate themselves to the noble task of labour and national construction. But in Malaysia, workers are not treated as equals. They are treated as slaves of Alliance feudal-compradore system.
Continue reading Celebrate May Day

Speech by DAP Organising Secretary and Parliamentary Candidate for Bandar Melaka, Mr. Lim Kit Siang, at a DAP General elections Public Rally at Mantin, Seremban Barat Parliamentary Constituency, on Monday, 14th April 1969 at 10p.m.

The workers in Malaysia have been one of the most neglected sections of the population in the last 13 years of Alliance rule.

This is because the Alliance government is a feudal compradors government which has no sympathy or understanding of the suffering and hardships of the laboring class.

Over the years, the plights of the workers have worsened, as a result of the deteriorating economic situation, the spiraling unemployment and a steeply rising cost of living.

When there is chronic mass unemployment, coupled with an anti-labour government and managements, the lot of the workers is an unbearable one. Continue reading DAP’s Six-Point New Deal for Workers

Speech by DAP Organising Secretary, Mr. Lim Kit Siang, at the inaugural meeting of the protem committee of the Kuchai DAP Branch on 25th March 1969 at 9 p.m.

In a statement on Monday, the Secretary-General of the Alliance, Tan Sri T.H.Tan, said no party could match the record of the Alliance in service to the workers.

It must come as a shock to the workers of Malaysia to find in Tan Sri T.H.Tan the self-styled now champion of Malaysian workers.

But it is so easy to expose the Alliance for its empty profession of concern for workers’ welfare.

A recent example is the lock-out of 70-odd workers by the management of Central Printing Co. at Petaling Jaya. The management locked –out the workers because the workers united to form a union, and submitted claims for revised salaries and improved working conditions. Continue reading The ‘new champion’ of Malaysian workers – Tan Sri T.H.Tan