GUATEMALAN COURT ADDRESSES DOMESTIC LABOR ISSUES

UNCLAS GUATEMALA 000593 SIPDIS SIPDIS E.O. 12958: N/A TAGS: ELAB PHUM PGOV GT SUBJECT: GUATEMALAN COURT ADDRESSES DOMESTIC LABOR ISSUES REF: A. 05 GUATEMALA 56 ¶B. 05 GUATEMALA 280 ¶C. 05 GUATEMALA 341 ¶D. 05 GUATEMALA 577 ¶1. Summary: Guatemala's Constitutional Court suspended two articles of the Guatemalan Labor Code that exempted domestic laborers from standard legal protections. The International Labour Organization (ILO) has had a standing recommendation to Guatemala to reform these articles for more than seven years. End Summary. ¶2. On March 22, the Constitutional Court temporarily suspended Articles 164 and 165 of the Labor Code, which specifically exempted domestic workers from protections officially enjoyed by other workers. Article 164 exempted domestic workers from regular limits on hours in a work shift and consecutive days worked, instead requiring only that domestic workers receive 10 hours off per day, eight of which must be continuous and at night. Article 164 also allowed six additional hours off on Sundays and holidays. ¶3. Article 165 guaranteed the right of an employer to fire a domestic employee if she had a contagious illness or any other illness that incapacitated the worker for more than a week. Under such a condition of dismissal, the employer would be obliged to pay severance of no more than four months salary, regardless of the length of service of the employee, and no other severance benefits of any kind. (Note: Article 165 also guaranteed the right of the employee to resign if the employer had a contagious illness, but this had no meaning as all employees have the right to resign at any time. End note.) ¶4. Those interested in the Guatemalan Labor Code are encouraged to consult its text, available on the Department of Labor funded website: leylaboral.com/guatemala. ¶5. Comment: For good or ill, the Constitutional Court has been the only method of reforming Guatemala's Labor Code since 2001, when the last significant revision was enacted by Congress (see Refs A-D, regarding the removal of sanction authority from the Labor Inspectorate). Legislative proposals to reform the code -- as recommended by the ILO -- to protect domestic workers and child laborers and to codify restrictions against sexual harassment have languished in the Tripartite Committee. Ironically, one of the ILO recommendations is that all Labor Code reforms must be vetted by the Tripartite Committee. Thus, each committee member has veto power over all proposals, leaving judicial review as the only effective method of labor law reform. DERHAM