The Ministry of Human Resources and Social Security, the State Administration of Work Safety and the All China Federation of Trade Unions made a joint decision to require construction firms to provide their workers with sufficient injury insurance to safeguard them against financial trouble coming from possible workplace accidents, Xinhua reported.
Li Dajun, an organizer of a migrant workers' group, said that almost 90 percent of workers in China's construction sector are not protected by a contract or provided with injury insurance. Li based this estimate from the hundreds of construction sites that he has visited in China.
According to the statement by the Vice Minister of Human Resources and Social Security, Hu Xiaoyi, the Chinese construction sector hires almost 45 million workers, and nearly 36 million of the said workers are susceptible to violations of basic employee rights.
Such is the story of a workplace mishap that happened to Li Hongkui.
Li spent almost a month in a hospital and was unable to work because he was hit by a falling object at a construction site in Beijing on Sept. 12, 2012. Since he did not have any labor contracts or insurance, he was not able to claim nor was he granted any kind of compensation.
Another problem is subcontracting to agents who are not qualified, which is an illegal practice that must be tackled, according to Li Huilin of Peking University.
As compliance to the new policy, no construction permits will be handed out to any projects if companies failed to give injury insurance or valid work contracts to construction workers.