Direct Request (CEACR) - adopted 2005, published 95th ILC session (2006)

The Committee notes with regret that the Government’s report contains no reply to previous comments. It hopes that the next report will include full information on the following matters raised in its previous direct request:

Prison labour

The Committee previously noted that section 37 of the Correctional Labour Code, as amended on 12 June 1992, provides that every convicted person is under an obligation to work, such work being exacted from them by the administration of correctional institutions either at state enterprises, or at enterprises of other forms of ownership, on a contract basis. It also noted the provision of section 21 of Act No. 5473-I, of 21 July 1993, on the institutions and bodies for the execution of sentences involving deprivation of freedom, according to which compulsory labour may be exacted from convicted prisoners at enterprises of any organizational or legal form, even if such enterprises do not belong to the executive penal system and are located out of the place of correctional institutions; compulsory labour is exacted in this case on the basis of a contract concluded between the administration of institutions for the execution of sentences and the enterprises concerned.

The Committee recalls in this connection that Article 2, paragraph 2(c), of the Convention exempts from its provisions "any work or service exacted from any person as a consequence of a conviction in a court of law, provided that the said work or service is carried out under the supervision and control of a public authority and that the said person is not hired to or placed at the disposal of private individuals, companies or associations". While this Article strictly prohibits that prisoners be hired to or placed at the disposal of private undertakings, the Committee has accepted, for the reasons set out in paragraphs 97-101 of its General Survey of 1979 on the abolition of forced labour, that schemes existing in certain countries under which prisoners may, particularly during the period preceding their release, voluntarily enter a normal employment relationship with private employers, do not fall within the scope of the Convention. As the Committee has repeatedly pointed out, only work performed in conditions of a free employment relationship can be held compatible with the explicit prohibition in Article 2, paragraph 2(c); this necessarily requires the formal consent of the person concerned and, in the light of the circumstances of the consent, i.e. the basic obligation to perform prison labour, and other restrictions on the prisoner’s freedom to take up normal employment, there must be further guarantees and safeguards covering the essential elements of a labour relation, such as a level of wages and social security corresponding to a free labour relationship, to remove the employment from the scope of Article 2, paragraph 2(c), which unconditionally prohibits that persons who are under an obligation to perform prison labour be hired to or placed at the disposal of private companies.

The Committee reiterates its hope that, taking into account these considerations, the Government will take the necessary measures in relation to the abovementioned legislation to ensure the observance of the Convention, and that it will provide, in its next report, information on law and practice regarding the work of prisoners for private enterprises.