South Australian Consolidated Acts South Australian Consolidated ActsSchedule 9—Worst Forms of Child Labour Convention 1999
C182
Worst Forms of Child Labour Convention, 1999
The General Conference of the International Labour Organization,
Having been convened at Geneva by the Governing Body of the International
Labour Office, and having met in its 87th Session on 1 June 1999, and
Considering the need to adopt new instruments for the prohibition and
elimination of the worst forms of child labour, as the main priority for
national and international action, including international cooperation and
assistance, to complement the Convention and the Recommendation concerning
Minimum Age for Admission to Employment, 1973, which remain fundamental
instruments on child labour, and
Considering that the effective elimination of the worst forms of child labour
requires immediate and comprehensive action, taking into account the
importance of free basic education and the need to remove the children
concerned from all such work and to provide for their rehabilitation and
social integration while addressing the needs of their families, and
Recalling the resolution concerning the elimination of child labour adopted by
the International Labour Conference at its 83rd Session in 1996, and
Recognizing that child labour is to a great extent caused by poverty and that
the long-term solution lies in sustained economic growth leading to social
progress, in particular poverty alleviation and universal education, and
Recalling the Convention on the Rights of the Child adopted by the United
Nations General Assembly on 20 November 1989, and
Recalling the ILO Declaration on Fundamental Principles and Rights at Work and
its Follow-up, adopted by the International Labour Conference at its 86th
Session in 1998, and
Recalling that some of the worst forms of child labour are covered by other
international instruments, in particular the Forced Labour Convention, 1930,
and the United Nations Supplementary Convention on the Abolition of Slavery,
the Slave Trade, and Institutions and Practices Similar to Slavery, 1956, and
Having decided upon the adoption of certain proposals with regard to child
labour, which is the fourth item on the agenda of the session, and
Having determined that these proposals shall take the form of an international
Convention;
adopts this seventeenth day of June of the year one thousand nine hundred and
ninety-nine the following Convention, which may be cited as the Worst Forms of
Child Labour Convention, 1999.
Article 1
Each Member which ratifies this Convention shall take immediate and effective
measures to secure the prohibition and elimination of the worst forms of child
labour as a matter of urgency.
Article 2
For the purposes of this Convention, the term child shall apply to all persons
under the age of 18.
Article 3
For the purposes of this Convention, the term the worst forms of child labour
comprises:
(a) all
forms of slavery or practices similar to slavery, such as the sale and
trafficking of children, debt bondage and serfdom and forced or compulsory
labour, including forced or compulsory recruitment of children for use in
armed conflict;
(b) the
use, procuring or offering of a child for prostitution, for the production of
pornography or for pornographic performances;
(c) the
use, procuring or offering of a child for illicit activities, in particular
for the production and trafficking of drugs as defined in the relevant
international treaties;
(d) work
which, by its nature or the circumstances in which it is carried out, is
likely to harm the health, safety or morals of children.
Article 4
1. The types of work
referred to under Article 3(d) shall be determined by national laws or
regulations or by the competent authority, after consultation with the
organizations of employers and workers concerned, taking into consideration
relevant international standards, in particular Paragraphs 3 and 4 of the
Worst Forms of Child Labour Recommendation, 1999.
2. The competent
authority, after consultation with the organizations of employers and workers
concerned, shall identify where the types of work so determined exist.
3. The list of the
types of work determined under paragraph 1 of this Article shall be
periodically examined and revised as necessary, in consultation with the
organizations of employers and workers concerned.
Article 5
Each Member shall, after consultation with employers' and workers'
organizations, establish or designate appropriate mechanisms to monitor the
implementation of the provisions giving effect to this Convention.
Article 6
1. Each Member shall
design and implement programmes of action to eliminate as a priority the worst
forms of child labour.
2. Such programmes of
action shall be designed and implemented in consultation with relevant
government institutions and employers' and workers' organizations, taking into
consideration the views of other concerned groups as appropriate.
Article 7
1. Each Member shall
take all necessary measures to ensure the effective implementation and
enforcement of the provisions giving effect to this Convention including the
provision and application of penal sanctions or, as appropriate, other
sanctions.
2. Each Member shall,
taking into account the importance of education in eliminating child labour,
take effective and time-bound measures to:
(a)
prevent the engagement of children in the worst forms of child labour;
(b)
provide the necessary and appropriate direct assistance for the removal of
children from the worst forms of child labour and for their rehabilitation and
social integration;
(c)
ensure access to free basic education, and, wherever possible and appropriate,
vocational training, for all children removed from the worst forms of child
labour;
(d)
identify and reach out to children at special risk; and
(e) take
account of the special situation of girls.
3. Each Member shall
designate the competent authority responsible for the implementation of the
provisions giving effect to this Convention.
Article 8
Members shall take appropriate steps to assist one another in giving effect to
the provisions of this Convention through enhanced international cooperation
and/or assistance including support for social and economic development,
poverty eradication programmes and universal education.
Article 9
The formal ratifications of this Convention shall be communicated to the
Director-General of the International Labour Office for registration.
Article 10
1. This Convention
shall be binding only upon those Members of the International Labour
Organization whose ratifications have been registered with the
Director-General of the International Labour Office.
2. It shall come into
force 12 months after the date on which the ratifications of two Members have
been registered with the Director-General.
3. Thereafter, this
Convention shall come into force for any Member 12 months after the date
on which its ratification has been registered.
Article 11
1. A Member which has
ratified this Convention may denounce it after the expiration of ten years
from the date on which the Convention first comes into force, by an act
communicated to the Director-General of the International Labour Office for
registration. Such denunciation shall not take effect until one year after the
date on which it is registered.
2. Each Member which
has ratified this Convention and which does not, within the year following the
expiration of the period of ten years mentioned in the preceding paragraph,
exercise the right of denunciation provided for in this Article, will be bound
for another period of ten years and, thereafter, may denounce this Convention
at the expiration of each period of ten years under the terms provided for in
this Article.
Article 12
1. The
Director-General of the International Labour Office shall notify all Members
of the International Labour Organization of the registration of all
ratifications and acts of denunciation communicated by the Members of the
Organization.
2. When notifying the
Members of the Organization of the registration of the second ratification,
the Director-General shall draw the attention of the Members of the
Organization to the date upon which the Convention shall come into force.
Article 13
The Director-General of the International Labour Office shall communicate to
the Secretary-General of the United Nations, for registration in accordance
with article 102 of the Charter of the United Nations, full particulars
of all ratifications and acts of denunciation registered by the
Director-General in accordance with the provisions of the preceding Articles.
Article 14
At such times as it may consider necessary, the Governing Body of the
International Labour Office shall present to the General Conference a report
on the working of this Convention and shall examine the desirability of
placing on the agenda of the Conference the question of its revision in whole
or in part.
Article 15
1. Should the
Conference adopt a new Convention revising this Convention in whole or in
part, then, unless the new Convention otherwise provides—
(a) the
ratification by a Member of the new revising Convention shall ipso jure
involve the immediate denunciation of this Convention, notwithstanding the
provisions of Article 11 above, if and when the new revising Convention shall
have come into force;
(b) as
from the date when the new revising Convention comes into force, this
Convention shall cease to be open to ratification by the Members.
2. This Convention
shall in any case remain in force in its actual form and content for those
Members which have ratified it but have not ratified the revising Convention.
Article 16
The English and French versions of the text of this Convention are equally
authoritative.
Cross references
Conventions: C029 Forced Labour Convention, 1930
Conventions: C138 Minimum Age
Convention, 1973
Recommendations: R035 Forced Labour (Indirect Compulsion)
Recommendation, 1930
Recommendations: R036 Forced Labour (Regulation)
Recommendation, 1930
Recommendations: R146 Minimum Age Recommendation, 1973
Supplemented: R190 Complemented by the Worst Forms of Child Labour
Recommendation, 1999
Constitution: 22: article 22 of the Constitution of the
International Labour Organisation