By Kwon Mee-yoo
Staff Reporter
From July, full-time union leaders on companies' payrolls will be subject to a stricter set of rules.
The revision of the Labor Law, which will be implemented in the second half of the year, stipulates that the number of full-time union leaders will be determined by the size of employees at a given workplace. They will also be bound by the so-called "time-off system" and be excused from work only under the circumstances agreed on by union and management.
The revision came after a tripartite agreement by the government, employers and some of the unions, allowing multiple unions at single workplaces and introducing restrictions on the full payment of wages to full-time union workers.
A committee composed of representatives recommended by unions, employers and the government will be given 50 days to work out a charter, which explain when and how full-time unionists will be excused from work.
The same committee will also deal with details governing the time-off system.
The revision also stipulates that a union with the membership of the majority of workers will be empowered to negotiate with the management, if competing unions fail to come up with an agreement on representation.
To make a single bargaining body, the unions should first go through negotiations among themselves to decide how they will be represented.
The representative of the negotiation body will be named by the major union, if no objections are raised.
The Labor Ministry will fine-tune the details of the revision until Jan. 21 before sending it to the Cabinet for endorsement. If everything goes as scheduled, the revision will go into effect starting in July.
The revision came after a number of close calls but only with compromises. Originally, the government wanted to implement two key factors - multiple unions and the abolition of wage payment for full-time union leaders by companies from January.
But the government settled for a compromise as the unions balked at the immediate implementation, calling for a staged implementation.