Jake's ViewCivil service is cosiest collective bargain
Pay disparity with private sector holds back the economy and warrants more attention than the government-led finger-pointing at the dockers
A collective bargaining law would not help the working class if the economy did not look good, Chief Executive Leung Chun-ying said yesterday.
Do I take it then, C.Y., that you would be in favour of a collective bargaining law if the economy did look good? And what is so bad about the look of the economy at the moment, Sir?
Let me set out my stance. My libertarian principles compel me to accept that if we encourage people to pool their money to form companies, then we have no grounds for discouraging people from pooling their labour to form unions. And, contrary to what our chief executive appears to say, we do already have a collective bargaining law. It is written into Article 27 of the Basic Law, which grants us freedom of association. Every international law decision has accepted that this confers the right to form trade unions for collective bargaining.
It doesn't force employers to bow to union demands but it does say that a striking dock worker can tell his boss, "Lee Cheuk-yan over there speaks for me", and that his government has no right to stop him from doing so.