Employers' Handbook on ILO Standards-related Activities

40
EMPLOYERS’ HANDBOOK ON ILO STANDARDS-RELATED ACTIVITIES
latter was the General Discussion at the ILC in 1996 on the Fee-Charging Employment
Agencies Convention (Revised) No. 96, which was revised by the ILC one
year later. There is also a specific revision procedure for Conventions (Art. 44,
Standing Orders of the ILC), which consists of amending the original text. However,
this has not been used for a number of years. Furthermore, if the objective of
revision is to supplement an older Convention rather than change its text or replace
it, another possibility is to adopt a (ratifiable) Protocol. Here too, the single discussion
procedure may be applied.
l Revision of a Recommendation:
A specific revision procedure for Recommendations is contained in Article 45,
Standing Orders of the ILC. In practice, however, the ILC has tended to replace
Recommendations rather than to use this procedure.
There are important legal differences between the revision of a Convention and a
Recommendation:
l In case of revision of a Convention, the standard final articles of ILO Conventions
(from Convention No. 27 onwards) provide for the following:
¡ Once the new revising Convention has come into force, the older instrument is
closed to further ratifications.
¡ Ratification of the new revising Convention by a member State automatically
involves denunciation of the older Convention (see below “Denunciation of
Conventions”);
¡ The older Convention remains in force, as it stands, for those member States
which have ratified it, but which have not ratified the new revising Convention.
l In case of revision of a Recommendation, which is less difficult because of its nonbinding
character, the new or amended instrument immediately takes the place of
the older one.
The employers in the GB have repeatedly stressed that, in their opinion, the revision
of older Conventions should take precedence over the adoption of Conventions on
new issues. Given the lack of acceptance of many older Conventions, one important
objective of revision from the employers’ point of view is to eradicate unnecessary
rigidities standing in the way of broader ratification and implementation. To this end,
flexibility devices should be used more systematically (see Chapter III). This seems all
the more necessary in view of the fact that certain revising Conventions, even after a
considerable time, have received fewer ratifications than the original instruments.
In the employers’ view, flexible ILS generally remain relevant for a longer period
and are consequently less liable to revision. Therefore, an important objective in framing
new Conventions should be the creation of “long-lasting” instruments, which are
unlikely to need revising for a long time.