The Employment Promotion Law, to take effect on January 1 next
year, is expected to boost employment by banning job
discrimination, a senior labor official said yesterday.
The law highlights the government's role in ensuring equal
opportunities in a fair employment environment and combating work
discrimination, Zhang Xiaojian, vice-minister of labor and social
security, said in an online interview.
The nine-chapter and 69-article law, adopted in August by the
Standing Committee of the National People's Congress (NPC), China's
top legislature, has a chapter explicitly outlining the
government's responsibility for employment aid.
He said the enterprises - labor-intensive small-and-medium ones
in particular - that hire people with living difficulty will be
subject to tax reduction and exemption and social security subsidy
under the new law. Disadvantaged people, too, will be entitled to
three years of tax reduction and exemption and micro-credit loans
in entrepreneurial activities.
Meanwhile, seniors unable to start their own businesses and are
not otherwise employed will be offered public welfare posts such as
patrollers and cleaners and receive work subsidies as well as
social security funds accordingly from local administrations, Zhang
said.
He asserted that the law will urge all levels of government to
"significantly expand communities' public welfare posts" for those
individuals identified as the most needy. Likewise, free
professional education and training will be prioritized for
children from zero-employment households.
A lifelong training system of employment and re-employment for
urban and rural workers alike, already set up with packages of
national training plans for employees and professional training
instructors, will be strengthened by the law's enactment. Earlier
reports also said the law would oblige employers to offer training
to their recruits.
In effect, the relevant content on improving such a training
mechanism is "the most important aspect of the lawand will prove
vital to China's long-term employment situation in the future,"
Zhang said.
(China Daily October 10, 2007)