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R162 Older Workers Recommendation, 1980
By: International Labor Organization
The General Conference of the International Labour Organisation,
Having been convened at Geneva by the Governing Body of the International
Labour Office, and having met in its Sixty-sixth Session on 4 June 1980,
and recalling that the Discrimination (Employment and Occupation)
Convention and Recommendation, 1958, do not include age among the grounds
for discrimination listed therein, but provide for possible additions to
the list, and recalling the specific provisions relating to older
workers in the Employment Policy Recommendation, 1964, and in the Human
Resources Development Recommendation, 1975, and
recalling the terms of existing instruments relating to the social
security of older persons, in particular the Invalidity, Old-Age and
Survivors' Benefits Convention and Recommendation, 1967, and recalling
also the provisions of article 6, paragraph (3), of the Declaration on
Equality of Opportunity and Treatment for Women Workers, adopted by the
International Labour Conference at its Sixtieth Session in 1975, and considering
it desirable to supplement the existing instruments with standards on
equality of opportunity and treatment for older workers, on their
protection in employment and on preparation for and access to retirement,
and
having decided upon the adoption of certain proposals with regard to older
workers: work and retirement, which is the fourth item on the agenda of
the session, and having determined that these proposals shall take
the form of a Recommendation, adopts this twenty-third day of June of
the year one thousand nine hundred and eighty, the following
Recommendation, which may be cited as the Older Workers Recommendation,
1980:
I. General Provisions
1.
(1) This Recommendation applies to all workers who are liable to encounter
difficulties in employment and occupation because of advancement in age.
(2) In giving effect to this Recommendation, a more precise definition of
the workers to whom it applies, with reference to specific age categories,
may be adopted in each country, in a manner consistent with national laws,
regulations and practice and appropriate under local conditions.
(3) The workers to whom this Recommendation applies are referred to herein
as as older workers.
2. Employment problems of older workers should be dealt with in the
context of an over-all and well balanced strategy for full employment and,
at the level of the undertaking, of an over-all and well balanced social
policy, due attention being given to all population groups, thereby
ensuring that employment problems are not shifted from one group to
another.
II. Equality of Opportunity and Treatment
3. Each Member should, within the framework of a national policy to
promote equality of opportunity and treatment for workers, whatever their
age, and of laws and regulations and of practice on the subject, take
measures for the prevention of discrimination in employment and occupation
with regard to older workers.
4. Each Member should, by methods appropriate to national conditions and
practice--
(a) make provision for the effective participation of employers' and
workers' organisations in formulating the policy referred to in Paragraph
3 of this Recommendation;
(b) make provision for the effective participation of employers' and
workers' organisations in promoting the acceptance and observance of this
policy;
(c) enact such legislation and/or promote such programmes as may be
calculated to secure the acceptance and observance of the policy.
5. Older workers should, without discrimination by reason of their age,
enjoy equality of opportunity and treatment with other workers as regards,
in particular--
(a) access to vocational guidance and placement services;
(b) access, taking account of their personal skills, experience and
qualifications, to--
(i) employment of their choice in both the public and
private sectors: provided that in exceptional cases age limits may be
set because of special requirements, conditions or rules of certain
types of employment;
(ii) vocational training facilities, in particular further training and
retraining;
(iii) paid educational leave, in particular for the purpose of training
and trade union education;
(iv) promotion and eligibility for distribution of tasks;
(c) employment security, subject to national law and practice relating to
termination of employment and subject to the results of the examination
referred to in Paragraph 22 of this Recommendation;
(d) remuneration for work of equal value;
(e) social security measures and welfare benefits;
(f) conditions of work, including occupational safety and health measures;
(g) access to housing, social services and health institutions, in
particular when this access is related to occupational activity or
employment.
6. Each Member should examine relevant statutory provisions and
administrative regulations and practices in order to adapt them to the
policy referred to in Paragraph 3 of this Recommendation.
7. Each Member should, by methods appropriate to national conditions and
practice--
(a) ensure as far as possible the observance of the policy referred to in
Paragraph 3 of this Recommendation in all activities under the direction
or control of a public authority;
(b) promote the observance of that policy in all other activities, in
co-operation with employers' and workers' organisations and any other
bodies concerned.
8. Older workers and trade union organisations as well as employers and
their organisations should have access to bodies empowered to examine and
investigate complaints regarding equality of opportunity and treatment,
with a view to securing the correction of any practices regarded as in
conflict with the policy.
9. All appropriate measures should be taken to ensure that guidance,
training and placement services provide older workers with the facilities,
advice and assistance they may need to enable them to take full advantage
of equality of opportunity and treatment.
10. Application of the policy referred to in Paragraph 3 of this
Recommendation should not adversely affect such special protection or
assistance for older workers as is recognised to be necessary.
III. Protection
11. Within the framework of a national policy to improve working
conditions and the working environment at all stages of working life,
measures appropriate to national conditions and practice designed to
enable older workers to continue in employment under satisfactory
conditions should be devised, with the participation of the representative
organisations of employers and workers.
12.
(1) Studies should be undertaken, with the participation of employers' and
workers' organisations, in order to identify the types of activity likely
to hasten the ageing process or in which older workers encounter
difficulties in adapting to the demands of their work, to determine the
reasons, and to devise appropriate solutions.
(2) These studies may be part of a general system for evaluating jobs and
corresponding skills.
(3) The results of the studies should be widely disseminated, in
particular to employers' and workers' organisations, and, as the case may
be, through them to the older workers concerned.
13. Where the reasons for the difficulties in adaptation encountered by
older workers are mainly related to advancement in age, measures in
respect of the type of activity in question should to the extent
practicable be applied so as to--
(a) remedy those conditions of work and of the working environment that
are likely to hasten the ageing process;
(b) modify the forms of work organisation and working time which lead to
stress or to an excessive pace of work in relation to the possibilities of
the workers concerned, in particular by limiting overtime;
(c) adapt the job and its content to the worker by recourse to all
available technical means and, in particular, to ergonomic principles, so
as to preserve health, prevent accidents and maintain working capacity;
(d) provide for a more systematic supervision of the workers' state of
health;
(e) provide for such supervision on the job as is appropriate for
preserving the workers' safety and health.
14. Among the measures to give effect to Paragraph 13, clause (b), of this
Recommendation, the following might be taken at the level of the
undertaking, after consulting the workers' representatives or with the
participation of their representative organisations, or through collective
bargaining, according to the practice prevailing in each country:
(a) reducing the normal daily and weekly hours of work of older workers
employed on arduous, hazardous or unhealthy work;
(b) promoting the gradual reduction of hours of work, during a prescribed
period prior to the date on which they reach the age normally qualifying
workers for an old-age benefit, of all older workers who request such
reduction;
(c) increasing annual holidays with pay on the basis of length of service
or of age;
(d) enabling older workers to organise their work time and leisure to suit
their convenience, particularly by facilitating their part-time employment
and providing for flexible working hours;
(e) facilitating the assignment of older workers to jobs performed during
normal day-time working hours after a certain number of years of
assignment to continuous or semi-continuous shift work.
15. Every effort should be made to meet the difficulties encountered by
older workers through guidance and training measures such as those
provided for in Paragraph 50 of the Human Resources Development
Recommendation, 1975.
16.
(1) With the participation of the representative organisations of
employers and workers, measures should be taken with a view to applying to
older workers, wherever possible, systems of remuneration adapted to their
needs.
(2) These measures might include--
(a) use of systems of remuneration that take account not
only of speed of performance but also of know-how and experience;
(b) the transfer of older workers from work paid by results to work paid
by time.
17. Measures might also be taken to make available to older workers if
they so desire other employment opportunities in their own or in another
occupation in which they can make use of their talents and experience, as
far as possible without loss of earnings.
18. In cases of reduction of the workforce, particularly in declining
industries, special efforts should be made to take account of the specific
needs of older workers, for instance by facilitating retraining for other
industries, by providing assistance in securing new employment or by
providing adequate income protection or adequate financial compensation.
19. Special efforts should be made to facilitate the entry or re-entry
into employment of older persons seeking work after having been out of
employment due to their family responsibilities.
IV. Preparation for and Access to Retirement
20. For the purposes of this Part of this Recommendation--
(a) the term prescribed means determined by or in virtue of one of the
means of action referred to in Paragraph 31 of this Recommendation;
(b) the term old-age benefit means a benefit provided in the case of
survival beyond a prescribed age;
(c) the term retirement benefit means old-age benefit the award of which
is subject to the cessation of any gainful activity;
(d) the expression age normally qualifying workers for an old-age benefit
means the prescribed age for award of old-age benefit with reference to
which such an award can be either advanced or postponed;
(e) the term long-service benefit means a benefit the grant of which
depends only upon the completion of a long qualifying period, irrespective
of age;
(f) the term qualifying period means a period of contribution, or a period
of employment, or a period of residence, or any combination thereof, as
may be prescribed.
21. Wherever possible, measures should be taken with a view to--
(a) ensuring that, in a framework allowing for a gradual transition from
working life to freedom of activity, retirement is voluntary;
(b) making the age qualifying for an old-age pension flexible.
22. Legislative and other provisions making mandatory the termination of
employment at a specified age should be examined in the light of the
preceding Paragraph and Paragraph 3 of this Recommendation.
23.
(1) Subject to its policy regarding special benefits, each Member should
endeavour to ensure that older workers whose hours of work are gradually
reduced and reach a prescribed level, or who start to work on a part-time
basis, receive, during a prescribed period prior to the date on which they
reach the age normally qualifying workers for an old-age benefit, a
special benefit in partial or full compensation for the reduction in their
remuneration.
(2) The amount and conditions of the special benefit referred to in
subparagraph (1) of this Paragraph should be prescribed; where
appropriate, the special benefit should be treated as earnings for the
purpose of calculating old-age benefit and the period during which it is
paid should be taken into account in such calculation.
24.
(1) Older workers who are unemployed during a prescribed period prior to
the date on which they reach the age normally qualifying workers for an
old-age benefit should, where an unemployment benefit scheme exists,
continue until such date to receive unemployment benefit or adequate
income maintenance.
(2) Alternatively, older workers who have been unemployed for at least one
year should be eligible for an early retirement benefit during a
prescribed period prior to the date on which they reach the age normally
qualifying workers for an old-age benefit; the grant of early retirement
benefit should not be made dependent upon a qualifying period longer than
that required at the age normally qualifying workers for an old-age
benefit and its amount, corresponding to that of the benefit the worker
concerned would have received at that age, should not be reduced to offset
the probable longer duration of payment, but, for the purpose of
calculating this amount, the period separating the actual age from the age
normally qualifying workers for an old-age benefit need not be included in
the qualifying period.
25.
(1) Older workers who--
(a) have been engaged in occupations that are deemed arduous or unhealthy,
for the purpose of old-age benefit, by national laws or regulations or
national practice, or
(b) are recognised as being unfit for work to a degree prescribed, should
be eligible, during a prescribed period prior to the date on which they
reach the age normally qualifying workers for an old-age benefit, for an
early retirement benefit the grant of which may be made dependent upon a
prescribed qualifying period; the amount of the benefit, corresponding to
that of the benefit the worker concerned would have received at the age
normally qualifying workers to an old-age benefit, should not be reduced
to offset the probable longer duration of payment, but, for the purpose of
calculating this amount, the period separating the actual age from the age
normally qualifying workers for an old-age benefit need not be included in
the qualifying period.
(2) The provisions of subparagraph (1) of this Paragraph do not apply to--
(a) persons in receipt of an invalidity or other pension on grounds of
incapacity for work corresponding to a degree of invalidity or incapacity
at least equal to that required to qualify for an early retirement
benefit;
(b) persons for whom adequate provision is made through occupational
pension schemes or other social security benefits.
26. Older workers to whom Paragraphs 24 and 25 do not apply should be
eligible for an early old-age benefit during a prescribed period prior to
the date on which they reach the age normally qualifying workers for an
old-age benefit, subject to such reductions as may be made in the amount
of any periodical old-age benefit they would have received at that age.
27. Under schemes in which the grant of an old-age benefit depends on the
payment of contributions or on a period of occupational activity, older
workers who have completed a prescribed qualifying period should be
entitled to receive a long-service benefit.
28. The provisions of Paragraphs 26 and 27 of this Recommendation need not
be applied by schemes in which workers can qualify for an old-age benefit
at the age of sixty-five or earlier.
29. Older workers who are fit for work should be able to defer their claim
to an old-age benefit beyond the age normally qualifying workers for such
a benefit, for example either for the purpose of satisfying all qualifying
conditions for benefit or with a view to receiving benefit at a higher
rate taking account of the later age at which the benefit is taken and, as
the case may be, of the additional work or contributions.
30.
(1) Retirement preparation programmes should be implemented during the
years preceding the end of working life with the participation or
representative organisations of employers and workers and other bodies
concerned. In this connection, account should be taken of the Paid
Educational Leave Convention, 1974.
(2) Such programmes should, in particular, enable the persons concerned to
make plans for their retirement and to adapt to the new situation by
providing them with information on--
(a) income and, in particular, the old-age benefit they can expect to
receive, their tax status as pensioners, and the related advantages
available to them such as medical care, social services and any reduction
in the cost of certain public services;
(b) the opportunities and conditions for continuing an occupational
activity, particularly on a part-time basis, and on the possibility of
establishing themselves as self-employed;
(c) the ageing process and measures to attenuate it such as medical
examinations, physical exercise and appropriate diet;
(d) how to use leisure time;
(e) the availability of facilities for the education of adults, whether
for coping with the particular problems of retirement or for maintaining
or developing interests and skills.
V. Implementation
31. Effect may be given to this Recommendation, by stages as necessary,
through laws or regulations or collective agreements or in any other
manner consistent with national practice and taking account of national
economic and social conditions.
32. Appropriate measures should be taken with a view to informing the
public and, more particularly, those responsible for guidance, training,
placement and the social services concerned, as well as employers, workers
and their respective organisations, of the problems which older workers
may encounter in respect, in particular, of the matters dealt with in
Paragraph 5 of this Recommendation and of the desirability of helping them
to overcome such problems.
33. Measures should be taken to ensure that older workers are fully
informed of their rights and opportunities and encouraged to avail
themselves of them.
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