Two community teachers from Jianchang county in Liaoning, both fired by the local government in 2007, talk about their attempts to seek redress and the corrupt and underhand activities of local officials.

Han Dongfang talks to a building sub-contractor who knew his contractor had used cheap cement but rather than report the hazard to the authorities, he used the evidence to blackmail the contractor into paying the wages his workers were owed.

Nearly a quarter of the workforce at a state-owned tobacco plant in Henan have had their wages slashed and their employment contracts “spun off” to an employment agency as part of the enterprise’s restructuring program.

Hotel employee, Zhu Peifang was summarily dismissed after 24 years of service, with no compensation, no year-end bonus and no wages for her work the previous month. With the help of CLB, Zhu was reinstated and paid six month’s wages in arrears.

Tang Liyong organized about one hundred fellow labourers to work on a retail and residential construction project in Anshan in 2006-07. More than a year after the project was completed, Tang and his colleagues had still not been paid. They are collectively owed more than 600,000 yuan.

Han Dongfang talks to Dai Deshu, a 67-year-old former tailor from Chongqing about the long and painful struggle of thousands of elderly artisans and handicraft workers discarded during the process of economic reform.

Han Dongfang talks to a workers’ representative trying to reclaim 24,500 yuan in wage arrears for his colleagues about the refusal of the boss to pay and the reluctance of the local labour bureau to get involved in this “small matter.”

In late October and early November 2008, primary and middle school teachers from several rural counties and districts in Chongqing staged a series of strikes demanding higher pay. Han Dongfang talked to three teachers about the strikes and their frustration at the lack of government action.

On 1 November 2008, bus drivers in Chengdu went on strike to secure higher wages. The bus drivers did not bother to ask their company trade union for help in securing a pay rise, and organized the strike by themselves. The union chairwoman, Ms Wen, criticized the strike, calling it “unreasonable.”

Between 1988 and 2002, the state-owned Lingyuan Iron & Steel Group laid-off workers with the promise of new jobs at a later date, but in reality they were farmed out to a labour supply company and rehired only as temporary supply workers.