Like many other vocational school students from a poor family, 20-year-old Young Cai got a factory job this summer to help pay his school fees. On 5 July, he started working at a shoe factory near his home in Quanzhou, Fujian, doing 11-hour shifts a day for a promised monthly salary of 1,500 yuan. When he was beaten by the boss for working too slowly he went to the local police station. The police came to the factory and ordered the boss to make a formal apology and pay Cai 1,500 yuan in compensation, in addition to the 600 yuan in wages he was already owed.

A vocational school in the southern province of Hunan is offering middle and high school graduates the chance to forge a new career, and mix with the rich and powerful, by training as a golf caddie. It seems clear that the only reason students would consider this course is not for the job itself but because they think it will put them in close proximity to the businessmen, government officials and influential investors who regularly prowl the country’s ever expanding network of golf courses and country clubs.

In late May, Xiong Hanjiang, a 19-year-old migrant worker from Sichuan visited his township labour bureau in the hope that officials there would help him get his two-month’s salary back from his employer, Hua Yi Porcelain. The bureau did in fact order the factory to give Xiong his 3,400 yuan salary but the boss refused to pay. When Xiong and his parents demanded payment, the boss and his family started to beat them and Xiong’s hamstrings were severed, leaving him possibly paralyzed for the rest of his life.

After two migrant workers riots in Guangdong early June, and apparently at the behest of Guangdong Party Secretary, Wang Yang, the province plans to honour its migrant workers by building a museum - the first official museum of its kind in China – showcasing their immeasurable contribution to the development and modernization of Guangdong.

At China Labour Bulletin, we hear tales of injustice and hardship on almost a daily basis but even so, these two appalling and ridiculous incidents stood out simply because of the absolute lack of compassion and humanity exhibited by both employer and government officials.

Nepotism has been around probably as long as the Chinese civil service itself. Even today, many officials consider it to be “common sense” that, given that they have been serving at the government for a long period of time, their relatives “deserve to be taken good care of as compensation for their hard work.”

The Hong Kong Foreign Correspondents Club was packed this lunchtime to listen to one of the territory's best known businessmen address the question of whether or not wage rises in China are a cause for concern. Bruce Rockowitz, President of Li & Fung (Trading) Ltd., was very much of the opinion that putting more money into the pockets of workers was without doubt a good thing for China – economically, socially and politically.

In late April, some 450,000 catering workers in Wuhan welcomed the signing of a collective agreement that promised them a basic wage 30 percent higher than the municipal minimum wage (currently 900 yuan), and a wage increase this year of at least nine percent on average.

 

But soon after the Labour Day celebrations died down, experts started questioning if this agreement is really that promising, even though it does involves the largest number of workers covered in one agreement and a big increase in pay.