Documents Sijic, Vesna 2 results

"The right to health and safety at work is the most important right in protecting workers at work. In Macedonia, this is regulated by a group of laws, among which the most important is the Law on Safety and Health at Work. These laws contain modern norms which aim to guarantee the efficient protection of workers in the workplace. However, in the Republic of Macedonia such provisions as are contained in these laws are insufficiently applied in practice. The authors' view is that the reasons for this can, basically, be reduced to three groups, i.e: the lack of a general legal culture; a lack of discipline in operation; and a lack of resources to purchase and maintain funds for professional safety and for enforcement measures for this purpose. Macedonian society has the possibility to establish an effective system ofprotection for workers' health and safety, provided that the state lays down proper mechanisms for its delivery. Nevertheless, in such a system, the main change agent will continue to be the educational institutions of society (family, schools, universities, etc.)."

"The right to form trade unions is provided by the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and other international documents adopted under the regulatory systems of the United Nations, the European Social Charter and ILO Conventions No. 87 and 98. The constitution of the Republic of Macedonia has implemented this right in the legal system of the Republic, regulating it in detail by the Law on Labour Relations and other laws, as well as by a number of collective agreements. Normative regulations concerning organising in the Republic are comprehensive and made according to international and European standards but, in practice, they are inconsistently applied. This has resulted in a denial of the right of workers to form trade unions and join them, the obstruction of trade union representatives, and a poor functioning of the system of trade union protection, etc. Concerning the relationship between trade unions and the government, the general impression is that trade unions are very close to the government and are under-active in protecting workers' rights. "