英文摘要 |
Following the nullification of Paragraph 1 of Article 49 of Taiwan’s Labor Standards Act, the establishment of regulations on night work protection has become urgent and necessary. This paper offers several viewpoints on the drafting of amendments to the Labor Standards Act on night work. First, regulations on night work must be placed in Chapter IV or V of the Labor Standards Act to protect night workers in a similar vein to the legal protection afforded to child workers and female workers; alternatively, they must be differentiated from labor condition-related protection afforded to night workers. Second, the provisions Occupational Safety and Health Act contains on the prevention of illness induced through an exceptional workload which night work is considered to behave a different function from the Labor Standards Act after the provisions on night work in the Labor Standards Act were broadened to include all workers and to remove all gender restrictions. In the proposed amendments, excluding revisions limiting the provisions of Article 49 specifically to workers who are mothers, only Article 52-1 stipulates a limit on daily work hours and whether flexible or longer work hours may be adopted. In these provisions, work hour limits and adjustments must differ between workers whose work hours regularly consist of nighttime hours and those who occasionally or infrequently work at night; the definition of night work can be debated and adjusted by groups or unions on the basis of industry differences or business scale. Furthermore, as part of efforts to identify the possible hazards of night work in a timely fashion, whether night workers can request regular and free special health examinations from their employers must be discussed. Whether they may transfer to day shifts for personal health or family care reasons must also be clarified. These matters are not addressed in the current proposed amendments to the Labor Standards Act, and, if they are neglected, then the purpose of the specific provisions on night work in the Labor Standards Act is in questions. The question of what this act protects specifically is a pressing topic of concern.
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