Telecommunications hardware giant Huawei has suspended a controversial plan to persuade thousands of long-serving employees to resign ahead of a new labour law after the All-China Federation of Trade Unions stepped in.
The proposal had caused uproar across the mainland in the past few weeks. The Communist Partycontrolled federation reprimanded Huawei and warned it not to repeat the same mistake, Xinhua reported yesterday.
Huawei had persuaded thousands of employees with at least eight years' service to leave their posts by offering redundancy packages of 20,000 to 160,000 yuan and promising to rehire them.
Huawei had reportedly shed 7,000 workers since September, but yesterday Xinhua put the number at 5,100.
The idea was widely seen as a tactic to allow the company to escape the obligations of the new Labour Contract Law.
From January 1, employees who have worked for more than 10 consecutive years or served more than two consecutive contract terms with a company will be entitled to ask for an 'open-end' contract, effectively making them permanent staff.
Permanent staff would no longer need to renew their contracts and would enjoy more job protection.