Korea puts into motion plan to punish striking truckers who do not return to work

Posted on : 2022-12-06 16:48 KST Modified on : 2022-12-07 12:26 KST
The Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport said Monday that it was conducting additional reviews of truck drivers and transport companies for noncompliance with return-to-work orders
Lawyers for the Korean Confederation of Trade Unions, Korean Metal Workers’ Union, Korean Public Service and Transport Workers Union, and the Korean Federation of Service Workers’ Unions; representatives of Minbyun-Lawyers for a Democratic Society; and other organizations in the labor community hold a press conference on the morning of Dec. 5 outside the National Human Rights Commission of Korea (NHRCK) building in Seoul where they called the Yoon administration’s issuing of return-to-work orders “unconstitutional” and requested that the NHRCK give its position on it. (Kim Jung-hyo/The Hankyoreh)
Lawyers for the Korean Confederation of Trade Unions, Korean Metal Workers’ Union, Korean Public Service and Transport Workers Union, and the Korean Federation of Service Workers’ Unions; representatives of Minbyun-Lawyers for a Democratic Society; and other organizations in the labor community hold a press conference on the morning of Dec. 5 outside the National Human Rights Commission of Korea (NHRCK) building in Seoul where they called the Yoon administration’s issuing of return-to-work orders “unconstitutional” and requested that the NHRCK give its position on it. (Kim Jung-hyo/The Hankyoreh)

As a strike by the Cargo Truckers’ Solidarity Division (TruckSol) entered its 12th day on Monday, the South Korean government launched a second field examination investigating alleged violations of administrative measures and the Fair Trade Act by truck drivers refusing to comply with a work start order.

TruckSol filed an administrative suit demanding the work start order be canceled, while petitioning the National Human Rights Commission of Korea (NHRCK) for a recommendation and statement of opinion on the matter.

On Monday, the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport (MOLIT) announced it was “conducting an additional examination to review the current status of transportation companies and vehicle owners [truck drivers] returning to their jobs after being issued a work start order in the initial field examination last week.”

The ministry added that it would be “immediately initiating administrative and criminal punishment procedures for those transportation companies and truck drivers that are determined in the second field examination to be in noncompliance with the work start order.”

In the wake of a work start order issued on Nov. 28 to cement transportation companies and truck drivers, the South Korean government conducted a field examination of 201 cement businesses last week. In the process, it found 33 companies and 791 drivers to be refusing transport work.

The government delivered the work start orders in person to the transport companies, while sending them by registered mail to 527 drivers with verified addresses and in person or by text message to 264 drivers whose addresses could not be established.

With its second field examination beginning on Monday, the MOLIT planned to verify whether business activities had been resumed by 33 of the businesses that had refused transport duties since receiving their work start order, along with 191 drivers confirmed to have received the orders by registered mail and 264 who had received them by text. Its plan is to initiate administrative and criminal punishment procedures against those who do not go back to work.

In cases of defiance of work start orders “without justifiable grounds,” the Trucking Transport Business Act imposes a 20-day suspension for a first act of noncompliance and revocation of trucking employee certification for a second. Criminal penalties including up to three years in prison or 30 million won (US$22,890) in fines may also be applied.

On Monday, TruckSol filed an administrative suit asking the Seoul Administrative Court to overturn the work start order. One of the plaintiffs was a TruckSol union member who received a photograph of the work start order by text.

The legal center of the Korean Public Service and Transport Workers’ Union (KPTU), which is representing the member, said, “Not only it is unclear what exactly is meant by the ‘national economy’ and ‘very serious crisis’ as conditions for invoking a work start order, but it’s difficult to conclude that the current situation is a ‘serious’ enough crisis to require last-ditch measures that violate substantive terms of the trucking employee’s basic rights.”

Once arguments begin in the administrative suit, the KPTU legal center plans to request a constitutionality review of Trucking Transport Business Act provisions related to work start orders.

The same day, the KPTU petitioned the NHRCK for a recommendation or statement of opinion, calling the government’s response to the TruckSol strike a “violation of basic rights and human rights.”

The Fair Trade Commission (FTC), which began a field investigation on Dec. 2 into possible Fair Trade Act violations by TruckSol, attempted on Monday to visit the KPTU headquarters in Seoul’s Deungchon neighborhood — the site of the TruckSol offices — to conduct another investigation.

That investigation did not end up happening after TruckSol raised objections to the methods. The FTC planned to carry out another field investigation Tuesday morning.

TruckSol has objected strongly to the FTC’s demands for it to submit information in 12 categories, including a list of union members and those who have left the union.

In a statement on Monday, TruckSol said, “There is no clear specification in the FTC’s investigation document as to what allegations the investigation is being initiated on, and the scope of the requested materials is so comprehensive and vague that there is no way of knowing why the materials in question need to be submitted.”

“To designate TruckSol as a ‘business association’ in investigating violations of the Fair Trade Act is a violation of International Labour Organization (ILO) Conventions [Nos. 87 and 98] on the freedom of association,” it continued.

Yun Ae-lim, a senior research fellow at the Seoul National University Law Research Institute, explained, “The government is regarding all trucking employees as ‘individual business operators’ unconditionally, without examining their different working situations, and claiming it is possible for the FTC to investigate them.”

“But in the European Union, the debate has progressed to the point where people are insisting that even genuinely self-employed people should have their right to collective bargaining guaranteed when they represent lone business operators with weak bargaining power,” she added.

By Park Tae-woo, staff reporter; Choi Ha-yan, staff reporter; Lee Ji-hye, staff reporter

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