Muttahiada Labour Federation (MLF) and Society for the Protection and Rights of Children (SPARC) have demanded of the government to constitute special laws for protecting the rights of children. In a group discussion held in Peshawar, on Saturday (August 29, 2009), MLF and SPARC activists expressed their lookout on the newly proposed Employment and Service Condition Act 2009, by the Labour and Manpower Ministry, indicating the weak points in the bill.

The proposed act is supposed to replace 11 existing acts and partly alter two others all which have been in force since 1991-93. The new act fixes the age for child labor at 14 years, as against 18 years of the existing law, and this is one of the aspects of great concern to human rights bodies. In addition, the recently proposed bill suggest an increase in the working hours of children from 4 hours to 7 hours – something that is likely to affect children in more than one way; they’ll find it harder to get education and their health will suffer. SPARC members also pointed to the absence of prohibition on child labor in hazardous occupations in the bill.

The speakers in the discussion demanded of the government to revise the bill for due reformation. They expressed concern over the repeated neglect of the government in case of formulating labour laws, whereby they are actually creating anti-labour laws. The Vice President of MLF also told that MLF would run a campaign of awareness against the proposed bill’s potential damage to labour.