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The Homeless People’s Federation Philippines,HPFP, participates in various municipal and village-leveldevelopment councils, including a fewlocal housing councils (See Case 5).Social protection reformReform of the social protection system is astrategic way to empower people. In India in2002, the National Commission on Labour proposeda national bill for workers in the unorganised(informal) sector with the objective of regulating‘the employment and conditions of serviceof unorganised sector workers and to provide fortheir safety, social security, health and welfare’.The bill provides for the establishment of Workers’Facilitation Centres to support and assistunorganised workers, provides for the setting upin the states of an Unorganised Sector Workers’Welfare Fund, with funds from government andcontributions by employers and registered workers;and sets out minimum conditions of service,including hours of work and minimum wages (SeeCase 6). In India in 2007, the National Commissionon Enterprises in the Unorganised Sector(NCEUS) has drafted and proposed two nationalbills on the conditions of work and social securityof workers in the unorganised (informal) sector:one for agricultural workers, the other for non-agriculturalworkers. Both bills incorporate provisionsfor regulating the conditions of work andsocial security of informal workers. The statutoryNational Social Security Scheme proposed by theNCEUS consists of the following package of minimumbenefits: illness, hospitalisation, maternity,disability and life insurance, and old age pension.Other promising examples of extending socialprotection to informal workers are from Ghanaand the Philippines. In Ghana, with joint supportfrom the government and ILO’s Decent Work programme,associations and individuals who havejoined local credit unions are encouraged to enrolin the National Health Insurance Programme.In the Philippines, the statutory social securitysystem (SSS) and the health insurance schemeshave been progressively made universal throughvoluntary schemes that are open to self-employedworkers through lower-priced packages and awider network of collection units, including banksand organised groups (See Case 7). Notableexamples are also found in Latin America; theyinclude efforts in Mexico to extend social securitycoverage to the informal sector; innovations in socialcoverage of the Solidario programme in Chile;first rights-based health coverage in Chile, andconditional cash transfers in some 14 countriesbeginning with Brazil and Mexico.Improvement of the quality of labour marketinstitutionsSeveral countries have introduced reforms to improvethe quality of labour market institutions. In2006, Chile introduced a reform in subcontractingprocedures to include more workers in formallabour rights arrangements. The objective is topromote subcontracting, while at the same timeensuring compliance with all the labour obligations.The law introduced a formal arrangementbetween subcontractors and the main firms tomeet a set of labour obligations. Direct responsibilitylies with the subcontractor, but the mainfirm has the right to demand from the subcontractora certificate of compliance issued by thelabour inspectorate agency and has the right towithhold payments from subcontractors in casesin which there are pending obligations vis-à-vistheir workers (See Case 8).Spain has over the last 20-25 years introduced aseries of reforms of its once highly-regulated systemin an attempt to better balance the demandsof an open market economy with the needs of168