Cablegate: Supreme Court Interpretation Will Help Workers

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P 042249Z SEP 06
FM AMEMBASSY BEIJING
TO RUEHC/SECSTATE WASHDC PRIORITY 5874
RUEHC/DEPT OF LABOR WASHDC
INFO RUEATRS/DEPT OF TREASURY WASHDC
RUCPDOC/USDOC WASHDC
RUEHSH/AMCONSUL SHENYANG 6812
RUEHGH/AMCONSUL SHANGHAI 5715
RUEHCN/AMCONSUL CHENGDU 7058
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RUEHIN/AIT TAIPEI 5923
RUEHHK/AMCONSUL HONG KONG 8085
RUEHGV/USMISSION GENEVA 1317

UNCLAS BEIJING 018554

SIPDIS

SIPDIS
SENSITIVE

DEPT FOR EAP/CM AND DRL/ILCSR
DEPT PASS USTR FOR KARESH, A. ROSENBERG, MCCARTIN
LABOR FOR ILAB - CARTER, OWENS, HELM, ZHAO, SCHOEPFLE
TREAS FOR OASIA/ISA-CUSHMAN
USDOC FOR 4420/ITA/MAC/MCQUEEN
GENEVA FOR CHAMBERLIN

E.O. 12958: N/A
TAGS: ELAB PGOV CH
SUBJECT: SUPREME COURT INTERPRETATION WILL HELP WORKERS
CLAIM BACK WAGES

REF: BEIJING 17905

(U) SENSITIVE BUT UNCLASSIFIED: NOT FOR INTERNET
DISTRIBUTION

1. (U) On August 30, China's Supreme Peoples Court
issued a series of judicial interpretations on handling
labor disputes. One of the interpretations will allow
employees who are owed back wages to go directly to the
courts for litigation, as long as they can produce IOUs
or other documentation to prove the debt, and the claim
involves no other labor-related issues. Prior to this
interpretation, courts generally classified wage
arrears cases as labor disputes, and would not hear
them unless the worker had first sought relief through
labor arbitration. The cost and time required for the
arbitration process deters many workers, particularly
migrants, from using it. The new interpretation will
go into effect October 1, in time for the annual spike
in wage arrears claims in the run-up to Chinese New
Year (late January or early February).

2. (SBU) Wage arrears cases account for a large
proportion (41% by government estimates) of labor
disputes in China. On August 31, Laboff discussed the
new judicial interpretation with Liu Cheng, Associate
Professor at the Shanghai Teachers University Law
School, and Director of the China Association of Labor
Law Studies. Liu welcomed the judicial interpretation
as a big help to victims of wage arrears. If workers
hold IOUs, he said, and many do, the cases are legally
simple and courts should be able to settle them very
quickly. But Liu said the interpretation is only a
transitional step, and that there should be no need for
so many court cases. What China really needs, Liu
said, is legislation that will effectively prevent wage
arrears in the first place.

SEDNEY

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