Convention concerning the Application of the Weekly Rest in Industrial Undertakings (Entry into force: 19 Jun 1923) Adoption: Geneva, 3rd ILC session (17 Nov 1921) – Status: Up-to-date instrument (Technical Convention).
Convention currently open for denunciation
Preamble
The General Conference of the International Labor Organisation,
Having been convened at Geneva by the Governing Body of the International Labor Office, and having met in its Third Session on 25 October 1921, and
Having decided upon the adoption of certain proposals with regard to the weekly rest day in industrial employment, which is included in the seventh item of the agenda of the Session, and
Having determined that these proposals shall take the form of an international Convention,
adopts the following Convention, which may be cited as the Weekly Rest (Industry) Convention, 1921, for ratification by the Members of the International Labor Organisation in accordance with the provisions of the Constitution of the International Labor Organisation:
- 1. For the purpose of this Convention, the term industrial undertaking includes–
- (a) mines, quarries, and other works for the extraction of minerals from the earth;
- (b) industries in which articles are manufactured, altered, cleaned, repaired, ornamented, finished, adapted for sale, broken up or demolished, or in which materials are transformed; including shipbuilding and the generation, transformation and transmission of electricity or motive power of any kind;
- (c) construction, reconstruction, maintenance, repair, alteration, or demolition of any building, railway, tramway, harbor, dock, pier, canal, inland waterway, road, tunnel, bridge, viaduct, sewer, drain, well, telegraphic or telephonic installation, electrical undertaking, gas work, water work, or other work of construction, as well as the preparation for or laying the foundations of any such work or structure;
- (d) transport of passengers or goods by road, rail, or inland waterway, including the handling of goods at docks, quays, wharves or warehouses, but excluding transport by hand.
- 2. This definition shall be subject to the special national exceptions contained in the Washington Convention limiting the hours of work in industrial undertakings to eight in the day and forty-eight in the week, so far as such exceptions are applicable to the present Convention.
- 3. Where necessary, in addition to the above enumeration, each Member may define the line of division which separates industry from commerce and agriculture.
- 1. The whole of the staff employed in any industrial undertaking, public or private, or in any branch thereof shall, except as otherwise provided for by the following Articles, enjoy in every period of seven days a period of rest comprising at least twenty-four consecutive hours.
- 2. This period of rest shall, wherever possible, be granted simultaneously to the whole of the staff of each undertaking.
- 3. It shall, wherever possible, be fixed so as to coincide with the days already established by the traditions or customs of the country or district.
Each Member may except from the application of the provisions of Article 2 persons employed in industrial undertakings in which only the members of one single family are employed.
- 1. Each Member may authorize total or partial exceptions (including suspensions or diminutions) from the provisions of Article 2, special regard being had to all proper humanitarian and economic considerations and after consultation with responsible associations of employers and workers, wherever such exist.
- 2. Such consultation shall not be necessary in the case of exceptions which have already been made under existing legislation.
Each Member shall make, as far as possible, provision for compensatory periods of rest for the suspensions or diminutions made in virtue of Article 4, except in cases where agreements or customs already provide for such periods.
- 1. Each Member will draw up a list of the exceptions made under Articles 3 and 4 of this Convention and will communicate it to the International Labor Office, and thereafter in every second year any modifications of this list which shall have been made.
- 2. The International Labor Office will present a report on this subject to the General Conference of the International Labor Organisation.
In order to facilitate the application of the provisions of this Convention, each employer, director, or manager, shall be obliged–
- (a) where the weekly rest is given to the whole of the staff collectively, to make known such days and hours of collective rest by means of notices posted conspicuously in the establishment or any other convenient place, or in any other manner approved by the Government;
- (b) where the rest period is not granted to the whole of the staff collectively, to make known, by means of a roster drawn up in accordance with the method approved by the legislation of the country, or by a regulation of the competent authority, the workers or employees subject to a special system of rest, and to indicate that system.
The formal ratification of this Convention, under the conditions set forth in the Constitution of the International Labor Organisation, shall be communicated to the Director-General of the International Labor Office for registration.
- 1. This Convention shall come into force at the date on which the ratification of two Members of the International Labor Organisation have been registered by the Director-General.
- 2. It shall be binding only upon those Members whose ratification have been registered with the International Labor Office.
- 3. Thereafter, the Convention shall come into force for any Member at the date on which its ratification has been registered with the International Labor Office.
As soon as the ratification of two Members of the International Labor Organisation have been registered with the International Labor Office, the Director-General of the International Labor Office shall so notify all the Members of the International Labor Organisation. He shall likewise notify them of the registration of the ratification which may be communicated subsequently by other Members of the Organisation.
Each Member which ratifies this Convention agrees to bring the provisions of Articles 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 and 7 into operation not later than 1 January 1924 and to take such action as may be necessary to make these provisions effective.
Each Member of the International Labor Organisation which ratifies this Convention engages to apply it to its colonies, possessions and protectorates, in accordance with the provisions of Article 35 of the Constitution of the International Labor Organisation.
A Member which has ratified this Convention may denounce it after the expiration of ten years from the date on which the Convention first comes into force, by an act communicated to the Director-General of the International Labor Office for registration. Such denunciation shall not take effect until one year after the date on which it is registered with the International Labor Office.
At such times as it may consider necessary the Governing Body of the International Labor Office shall present to the General Conference a report on the working of this Convention and shall examine the desirability of placing on the agenda of the Conference the question of its revision in whole or in part.
The French and English texts of this Convention shall both be authentic.
